Young Sri Lankan Research Articles

Intention-behavior gap in greener consumption among young Sri Lankan consumers

In today’s world, we heavily rely on natural resources for activities, business, and survival. We are consuming resources at an unsustainable rate. However, our planet can only produce a finite number of resources and can only withstand a certain degree of greenhouse gas emissions. With the unbearable increase in natural resource consumption and green gas emissions, we are forced to experience various global challenges including climate change, desertification, lack of resources, loss of biodiversity, land degradation, etc. There is a burgeoning movement to adopt sustainable practices to mitigate these adverse consequences. Some companies have even developed sustainability programs, guidelines and plans to achieve sustainable goals [1]. Specifically, people are moving towards green consumption. As a result, studies on green consumption have emerged as a significant new frontier over the past few years attracting attention from both academics and professionals.

MOTIVATION OF LUXURY FASHION BRAND CONSUMPTION AMONG YOUNG SRI LANKAN CONSUMERS

Investigating the motivational elements that influence young Sri Lankan fashion customers’ desire to purchase from luxury fashion companies is the goal of this essay. In terms of three dimensions, this study characterized two key luxury reasons as internal and external. This takes into account, on the one hand, the value of self-identity and hedonic pleasure, which correspond to the consumption of high-end clothing as personal style, and prestige value, which refers to a social statement. The study also explores which incentive has a bigger impact on young Sri Lankans’ intention to purchase premium fashion brands. To reflect the suggested linkages among linked variables, a conceptual model was created. For the investigation, the convenience sampling approach was employed. at addition to using Google forms, mall agents delivered survey questionnaires for completion and return at high-end clothing stores. Young consumers between the ages of 18 and 30 make up the population of this study, and respondents who were shopping in Colombo were called in order to gather data. 138 of the 200 surveys were returned, and SPSS 16 was used to analyze the data. This study provides some insight into the reasoning behind fashion purchases and the luxury fashion consumption habits of young Sri Lankan consumers in particular. According to the study’s findings, the variable that describes external worth and has a higher significant value than the other two factors is prestige value. It has been discovered that external motivation has a greater influence on the intention to acquire luxury fashion brands than internal motivation, indicating that the young Sri Lankan was motivated by external factors to buy ostentatious luxury fashion labels.

Concomitant Guillain–Barré Syndrome in a young Sri Lankan male with severe ulcerative colitis

BackgroundGuillain–Barré Syndrome is an immune mediated polyneuropathy. Ulcerative Colitis is an immune mediated chronic inflammatory condition mainly of the large intestine. Guillain–Barré Syndrome can present as a rare extraintestinal manifestation of Ulcerative Colitis when in remission or in a relapse. However, the concomitant presentation of Guillain–Barré Syndrome during a relapse of Ulcerative Colitis is very rare and only a few cases are reported to date.Case presentationA 24 year old young male diagnosed of Ulcerative Colitis presented with bloody diarrhea of frequency more than six times a day. He had been in clinical remission even after defaulting treatment for more than a year. He had also noted difficulty in walking prior to admission to the hospital. He was managed as for a severe relapse of Ulcerative Colitis and Guillain–Barré Syndrome. Appropriate management of both the illnesses helped him to recover.ConclusionImmune mediated diseases can have rare coexisting presentations. We report a case of Ulcerative Colitis with concomitant Guillain–Barré Syndrome. It is essential to be open minded and timely, appropriate treatment led to successful management of both the illnesses.

Young elephants in a large herd maintain high levels of elephant endotheliotropic herpesvirus-specific antibodies and do not succumb to fatal haemorrhagic disease.

Elephant endotheliotropic herpesviruses (EEHVs) have co-existed with elephants for millions of years, yet may cause fatal haemorrhagic disease (EEHV-HD), typically in elephants between 1 and 10 years of age. EEHV is omnipresent in (sub)adult elephants, and young elephants with low EEHV-specific antibody levels are at risk for EEHV-HD, suggesting that fatal disease may occur due to an insufficiently controlled primary infection. To further address this hypothesis, sera of three large elephant cohorts were subjected to a multiple EEHV species ELISA: (I) 96 Asian elephants between 0 and 57 years, including 13 EEHV-HD fatalities, from European zoo herds typically sized five to six elephants, (II) a herd of 64 orphaned elephants aged 0-15 years at the Elephant Transit Home in Sri Lanka and (III) 31 elephants aged 8-63 years, part of a large herd of 93 elephants at Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage, Sri Lanka. All Sri Lankan elephants showed high EEHV-specific antibody levels regardless of their age. While antibody levels of most European zoo elephants were comparable to those of Sri Lankan elephants, the average antibody level of the European juveniles (1-5 years of age) was significantly lower than those of age-matched Sri Lankan individuals. Moreover, the European juveniles showed a gradual decrease between 1 and 4 years of age, to be attributed to waning maternal antibodies. Maintenance of high levels of antibodies in spite of waning maternal antibodies in young Sri Lankan elephants is likely due to the larger herd size that increases the likelihood of contact with EEHV-shedding elephants. Together with the observation that low levels of EEHV-specific antibodies correlate with increased numbers of EEHV-HD fatalities, these results suggest that infection in presence of high maternal antibody levels may protect calves from developing EEHV-HD, while at the same time activating an immune response protective in future encounters with this virus.

Neurocysticercosis in a young Sri Lankan presenting with adult onset epilepsy

Introduction Neurocysticercosis(NCC) is a rare neurological disorder caused by the larval stage of the pork tapeworm Taenia solium (TS). Even though cysticercosis is endemic in India it has not been reported from Sri Lanka in an adult.

Seven Years in Sihagiri Bim - An Account of a Sri Lankan-Swedish Collaboration in Settlement Archaeology in Sigiriya 1988—1995

During the course of seven years Sri Lankan and Swedish archaeologists in collaboration built up a core of what is today the Sri Lankan settlement archaeology. Through surveys, excavations and ethnoarchaeological studies an understanding was gradually obtained regarding settlements and subsistence strategies of the Sri Lankan dry zone, from the Mesolithic to the present, and a generation of young Sri Lankan archaeologists got a fair amount of necessary field training. The primary objective was to develop the human resources of Sri Lankan archaeology, but something can also be said about the research results of the project. This article gives a generalised background and, in very brief outline, an overview of the work done, its methodology, constraints and results.

The Worldmaking Agency of the Sri Lankan Travel Blogger

This article presents a scrutiny of the powerful "worldmaking" role performed by English language travel writers in the context of Sri Lanka. It critically positions travel representations as a crucial means of knowledge production that shapes the way Sri Lanka is known and experienced. In that, it examines an emerging version of the country produced by young Sri Lankan travel bloggers through their employment of an "activist gaze" alongside the use of a "promotional gaze" by professional tourism writers. The article illuminates each of these distinctive worldmaking roles; the latter engaging the authority of tourism in constructing/perpetuating a particular favored version of the country to persuade the global tourist, and the former's "aware" agency in constructing a potential or alternative representation distinctive from the first. However, surpassing an exploration of representations and their worldmaking power, the article sheds light on the way writers are inculcated into certain standpoints and their negotiation of these through the employment of the Bourdieusian concepts of habitus, capital, and field. As such, it innovatively combines structure and agency in the study of tourism representations, unveiling the social implications underlying worldmaking and thereby elucidating the critical link between the English language, travel writing and social class in an understudied postcolonial context of South Asia.

Core Stability Index for Healthy Young Sri Lankan Population

Core Stability Index for Healthy Young Sri Lankan Population

Evaluation of bipolar lengths of the kidneys in healthy Sri Lankan adults in view of assessing the need for nomograms

Introduction: Renal sizes are of immense use to diagnose renal pathologies. As ethnic variations are known to influence renal sizes, we aimed to assess the ethnic variations in bipolar renal length (RL) and kidney to body height ratio (KBR) of a young adult Sri Lankan population. Methods: Healthy adults were recruited, by excluding subjects with previous renal surgeries, renal diseases, or other chronic illnesses. Bilateral RLs were measured sonographically. Results: The study sample consisted of 215 individuals (100 females) with an age range of 19-36 years (mean age=24 years). Mean right RL was 9.77±0.78cm; mean left RL was 10.16±0.83cm; mean KBR of the right kidney was 0.60±0.05mm/cm and left kidney was 0.63±0.05mm/cm. Right and left RLs and KBRs of males were 9.82±0.76cm; 10.3±0.78cm and 0.59±0.05mm/cm; 0.62±0.05mm/cm respectively and same parameters in females were 9.71±0.8cm; 10.0±0.9cm and 0.62±0.05mm/cm; 0.64±0.05mm/cm respectively. Irrespective of gender, left RL and KBR were higher than those of the right side (p Conclusions: This preliminary study can be considered as the first step in establishing age and gender specific reference values for RL and KBR for a Sri Lankan population. Due to ethnic variations, accuracy of using renal nomograms from other populations as reference values raises serious concerns.

Aspects of Moral Character, Civic Purpose, Social Identity in relevance to the Psychological Well-being of Adolescents in Sri Lanka

Moral character is defined as the complex constellation of psychological characteristics that motivate and enable persons to function as moral agents competently. Character is composed of various character strengths, and these are trainable personal characteristics. Purpose is the long-term, progressive intention to accomplish specific aims that are meaningful to self and the broader world. Character strengths and purpose in adolescence is associated with academic achievement and long-term mental and physical well-being. Identity crisis in adolescence is associated with moral character formation, developing a purpose and psychological well-being. Sri Lanka leads human development indices (HDI) in the region. Retention in secondary schooling is high, but higher education enrolment is less than 20% and below the average for lower-middle income countries. Therefore, more than 80% of adolescents exit the educational system without entering a standard tertiary education course. After leaving school, they do not have opportunities in a structured environment to promote desirable character strengths. Despite laws against child cruelty, corporal punishment and psychological aggression are highly prevalent in Sri Lankan schools. There is sound research evidence that this method is counterproductive to long-term mental well-being and character development. Psychiatry is, at times, criticised for only focusing on psychopathology and not on overall positive mental health. Child and adolescent mental health expertise are limited in the country, and psychiatrists need to look beyond diagnostic categories to facilitate and support the character development of young Sri Lankans. Considering this context, there is a need for school-based, culturally relevant character development programmes for Sri Lankan adolescents. These programmes need to be developed recognising moral, ethical, social and cultural values, employing multi-sectoral collaboration. There has been a rising interest world over on character development in adolescents and its relevance to the mental well-being and future workforce of a country. Even though there have been several publications from the West, we could not access any publications on adolescent character development’s relevance to psychological well-being from Sri Lanka. This article discusses recent and relevant literature on character development in adolescence and the potential application of this evidence to the well-being of Sri Lankan adolescents.

Among young Sri Lankan patients with diabetes, how do lipid profiles differ between those with and without metabolic syndrome?

AimsMetabolic syndrome (MetS) is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease (CVD). Apolipoproteins are emerging as powerful predictors of CVD. We aimed to study associations of metabolic syndrome and apoB, apoAI, apoB/AI ratio in young Sri Lankans with type 2 diabetes. Materials & methodsBlood samples were available from 690 patients with type 2 diabetes in Sri Lanka Young Diabetes Study, and were analysed for apoB, apoAI, total cholesterol (TC), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDLC), triglycerides (TG) and glycated haemoglobin (HbA1c). Their associations with MetS as perNCEP/ATPIII criteria were studied. ResultsMetS was present in 60.9% of subjects. Of those with MetS, 76.0% were women. Those with MetS had higher apoB (1.27 V s 1.19 mmol/L; p = 0.001), apoB/AI (0.80 V s 0.75; p = 0.001), non-HDL cholesterol (NHDLC) (4.15 V s 3.98 mmol/L; p = 0.002),and triglycerides (1.51 V s 1.31 mmol/L; p < 0.001) and lower apoAI (1.58 V s 1.60 mmol/L; p = 0.03) and HDLC (1.02 V s 1.16 mmol/L, p < 0.001). ApoB and apoB/AIlevels increased significantly as the number of MetS components increased. ApoB and apoB:AI ratio were independently associated with MetS and components. ConclusionMetS showed a high prevalence among young Sri Lankans with diabetes. Elevated apoB is commonly clustered with other risk indicators in MetS.

Bad Buddhists, Good Buddhists and True Buddhists

The purpose of this article is to discuss very briefly a few contemporary issues on, preaching interpretations and teaching practices of the Buddha from an expatriate’s point of view. First of all I would like to insist that Buddha never preached Buddhism but expounded Dhamma. Discussing these issues is important due to three main reasons. Firstly, from a religious view point such a debate would arouse our own Buddhist cultural thinking, especially among the migrated young Sri Lankan community that will contribute to protect and sustain our value system. Secondly, in a theoretical sense, the points raised here might help to optimize our understanding on the Buddha’s teaching and therefore, could serve to clear certain misconceptions that act as road blocks for non-Buddhists to become Buddhists. Thirdly, from a philosophical point of view, such discussions could inspire interested persons to engage in for further reading, learning through investigations and to accumulate knowledge towards achieving wisdom and mindfulness to become true Buddhists. This article is organized and presented as follows. First, it outlines the evolution of religious beliefs and analyses the composition of religious faiths in today’s world as an approach to this discussion. Then it discusses five main issues namely; the peer pressure to the young and the Sinhala Buddhist values; how do we know that we know which we believe as we know? Is chanting five precepts adequate? Westernizing Buddhism and Buddhismizing the West; and finally it provides a brief conclusion.

A young female presenting with heart failure secondary to eosinophilic myocarditis: a case report and review of the literature

BackgroundEosinophilic myocarditis is one of the fatal complications of idiopathic hypereosinophilic syndromes. Given the rarity of this form of myocarditis, it is often under-recognized. We describe a young girl who presented with features of heart failure. To our knowledge, this is the first reported case of eosinophilic myocarditis in a young Sri Lankan female.Case presentationA previously healthy 21 year old Sri Lankan female admitted with shortness of breath for 1 week duration with associated low grade fever and profuse sweating. She was mildly febrile and dyspnoeic with absent ankle oedema. She was tachycardic and had elevated Jugular venous pressure with negative Kussmaul sign. Blood pressure was 100/70 mmHg. Clinically there was no cardiomegaly and heart sounds were slightly muffled with gallop rhythm. Bilateral basal fine end inspiratory crackles and mild hepatosplenomegaly were noted. The laboratory examinations showed leucocytosis with severe eosinophilia with no abnormal cells. Her ESR, Troponin I and Brain natriuretic peptide were elevated with normal CRP and electrocardiogram showed sinus tachycardia with wide spread ST depression. Heart failure was evident on chest X-ray and 2D-echocardiogram showed global left ventricular hypokinesia with 40% ejection fraction and a thin layer of pericardial effusion. Mild hepatosplenomegaly without lymphadenopathy was detected in the ultrasound scan. Bone marrow biopsy showed hypereosinophilia with no evidence of bone marrow infiltration. FIP1L1–PDGFRA fusion transcript and BCR–ABL transcript were not detected. Secondary causes for hypereosinophilia were excluded and the diagnosis of idiopathic hypereosinophilic syndrome and eosinophilic myocarditis was made. She had good response to steroids clinically and biochemically with complete recovery of left ventricular function. She is now on steroid to be continued at least 6 months to 1 year.ConclusionEosinophilic myocarditis is a rare but fatal disease if left untreated. Hence clinicians should have high index of suspicion to diagnose eosinophilic myocarditis in clinical context of heart failure due to myocarditis. The diagnoses of eosinophilic myocarditis may often be challenged especially in a poor recourse setting. However available investigation should be used to diagnose this condition without delay. Early treatment with systemic steroids may prevent fatal outcome and therapies for this disease have yet to be validated in large prospective studies.

Communities of belonging in the temporariness of the Danish Asylum System: Shalini’s anchoring points

ABSTRACTRefugees often find themselves in a protracted situation of temporariness, as applications for asylum are processed, deportations negotiated and possible extensions of temporary protection status considered within the context of increasingly restrictive governmental policies across Europe. Through the case of a young Sri Lankan woman who arrived in Denmark as an ‘unaccompanied asylum-seeking minor’ and spent five years within the Danish asylum system, this article explores how she experienced moving through different legal categories and the institutional settings associated with them. I argue that, by engaging in social relations in the localities where she was situated, she developed places of belonging that could serve as ‘anchoring points’ providing some measure of stability in her otherwise unpredictable and precarious life situation. This case suggests that, even under conditions of protracted temporariness and legal uncertainty, individuals are able to create important anchoring points and develop communities of belonging that can serve them in a difficult process of belonging to Denmark.

‘Even though a man takes the major role, he has no right to abuse’: future male leaders’ views on gender-based violence in Sri Lanka

ABSTRACT Background: Distinct gender roles influence gender inequality and build the foundation for gender-based violence. Violence against women is a major public health problem in all societies, and a violation of human rights. Prevalence surveys on gender-based violence have been published from Sri Lanka, but qualitative studies on men’s perceptions are lacking. Objectives: The aim of this study was to explore young educated Sri Lankan men’s perceptions of violence against women. Methods: Seven focus-group discussions were held. Men at the end of their university studies were purposefully selected. A topic guide was used, covering various scenarios of violence against women. Qualitative content analysis was carried out. Results: Four categories were developed through the analytic process: fixed gender roles – patriarchal values are accepted in society, female mobility control, and slowly changing attitudes; violence not accepted but still exists – sexual harassment exists everywhere, different laws for different people, female tolerance of violence, and men’s right to punish; multiple factors cause violence – alcohol, violent behavior is inherited, violence culturally accepted, low education, and lack of communication; and prevention of violence against women – both parents must engage and socialize girls and boys equally, life skills education, premarital counselling, working places value clarification, and more women in politics and boards are suggested. Conclusions: Medical and management students, possible future male leaders of the country, have suggestions of prevention strategies in life skills to reduce gender-based violence and to increase knowledge of health consequences with the aim of changing attitudes.

Impact of personality on Facebook usage: special reference to young Sri Lankan users

Impact of personality on Facebook usage: special reference to young Sri Lankan users

Impact of personality on Facebook usage: special reference to young Sri Lankan users

Personality of Facebook users can be identified as the leading factor in the way they behave in the Facebook context. Current study examines the impact of personality traits on Facebook usage by considering it as features usage (status updates, comments, wall post, private messages, chat, groups and applications) and as general usage (time spends in Facebook site). This research is based on primary data collected through a self-administered questionnaire, administered to a sample of 182 undergraduates in Sri Lanka. Findings revealed that there is a significant impact of personality traits on Facebook feature usage as well as general usage. Furthermore, we found differences between personality traits for both Facebook features usage and general Facebook usage. Effects of cultural motives, values and beliefs of the groups were recognised as areas for further research.

Determinants of Young Sri Lankan Individuals’ Intention to Engage in Viral Marketing

Despite the prolific growth of viral marketing, factors that determine successful viral marketing campaigns remain largely unknown. Since the extant literature postulates that individual who pass along messages play a vital role in viral marketing, this paper examines the factors that determine the individuals’ message pass along intention in light of the behavioural theory proposed by Ajzen, namely, the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), and the interpersonal relations theory proposed by Schutz, namely, Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation (FIRO). The data collected from 391 young undergraduates in Sri Lanka were analyzed using the Structural Equation Modeling method. The results revealed that perceived behavioural control, attitude towards viral marketing, subjective norms, and need for affection and need for control are influential in determining the intention among young individuals to engage in viral marketing. Thus, the findings reveal that firms may need to develop different strategies to manipulate those critical factors that affect one’s intention to engage in viral marketing so as to enhance the effectiveness of viral marketing campaigns.

Wireless Capsule Endoscopy in Small Bowel Crohn’s Disease

Crohn’s disease (CD) is one of the two types of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) characterized by immune-mediated granulomatous bowel inflammation leading to a variety of intestinal and extra-intestinal manifestations. Although gastrointestinal endoscopy remains an important investigation in macroscopic diagnosis, the subgroup of 20-30% patients with small bowel-limited disease does not benefit either from endoscopy or barium studies. We report a case of a young Sri lankan male who presented with long term malabsorption and chronic hypoalbuminemia, extensively investigated for the underlying cause finally being diagnosed to have small bowel Crohn’s disease following wireless video capsule endoscopy. The case highlights the fact that with the advent and increased use of wireless capsule endoscopy, a better alternative is available for evaluating suspected small bowel CD without radiation exposure and its use should be made popular among the clinicians since the facility is available in the government sector and the prevalence of IBD is found to be significant in the local population than it was once thought to be.

The effect of dietary changes on distinct components of the metabolic syndrome in a young Sri Lankan population at high risk of CVD.

South Asian populations are predisposed to early onset of the metabolic syndrome. Lifestyle intervention programmes have demonstrated a reduction in the metabolic syndrome and CVD risk; however, the most effective components of the multi-faceted lifestyle interventions are unknown. We studied 2637 Sri Lankan males (n 1237) and females (n 1380), with a mean BMI of 23·9 (sd 4·2) kg/m2, aged 22·5 (sd 10·0) years, who had participated in a 5-year lifestyle-modification programme to examine the effect of dietary changes on distinct components of the metabolic syndrome. The dietary intervention comprised advice to replace polished starches with unpolished starches, high-fat meat and dairy products with low-fat products and high-sugar beverages and snacks with low-sugar varieties. For the purposes of this analysis, data from the control and intensive lifestyle groups were combined. Anthropometric and biochemical data were recorded, and a FFQ was completed annually. Multiple regression was used to determine the effect of the dietary changes on distinct components of the metabolic syndrome. The ratio unpolished:polished rice was inversely related to change in fasting glucose (β=-0·084, P=0·007) and TAG (β=-0·084, P=0·005) and positively associated with change in HDL-cholesterol (β=0·066, P=0·031) at the 5-year follow-up after controlling for relevant confounders. Red meat intake was positively associated with fasting glucose concentrations (β=0·05, P=0·017), whereas low-fat (β=-0·046, P=0·018) but not high-fat dairy products (β=0·003, P=0·853) was inversely related to glucose tolerance at the follow-up visit. Replacement of polished with unpolished rice may be a particularly effective dietary advice in this and similar populations.