Displaying publications 1 - 20 of 110 in total

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  1. Fulltext What matters to infrequent customers: a pragmatic approach to understanding perceived value and intention to revisit trendy coffee café
    Ting H, Thurasamy R
    Springerplus, 2016;5:651.
    PMID: 27330917 DOI: 10.1186/s40064-016-2259-5
    Notwithstanding the rise of trendy coffee café, little is done to investigate revisit intention towards the café in the context of developing markets. In particular, there is a lack of study which provides theoretical and practical explanation to the perceptions and behaviours of infrequent customers. Hence, the study aims to look into the subject matter by using the theory of reasoned action and social exchange theory as the underpinning basis. The framework proposed by Pine and Gilmore (Strat Leadersh 28:18-23, 2000), which asserts the importance of product quality, service quality and experience quality in a progressive manner, is used to decompose perceived value in the model so as to determine their effects on intention to revisit the café. Given the importance to gain practical insights into revisit intention of infrequent customers, pragmatism stance is assumed. Explanatory sequential mixed-method design is thus adopted whereby qualitative approach is used to confirm and complement quantitative findings. Self-administered questionnaire-based survey is first administered before personal interview is carried out at various cafés. Partial least squares structural equation modelling and content analysis are appropriated successively. In the quantitative findings, although product quality, service quality and experience quality are found to have positive effect on perceived value and revisit intention towards trendy coffee café, experience quality is found to have the greater effect than the others among the infrequent customers. The qualitative findings not only confirm their importance, but most importantly explain the favourable impressions they have at trendy coffee café based on their last in-store experience. While product and service quality might not necessary stimulate them to revisit trendy coffee café, experience quality driven by purposes of visit would likely affect their intention to revisit. As retaining customers is of utmost importance to businesses, and infrequent customers more than often make up the majority of the customers, the study provides meaningful and practical understanding of revisit intention.
  2. Fulltext Service innovation management practices in the telecommunications industry: what does cross country analysis reveal?
    Rahman SA, Taghizadeh SK, Ramayah T, Ahmad NH
    Springerplus, 2015;4:810.
    PMID: 26722630 DOI: 10.1186/s40064-015-1580-8
    Service innovation management practice is currently being widely scrutinized mainly in the developed countries, where it has been initiated. The current study attempts to propose a framework and empirically validate and explain the service innovation practices for successful performance in the telecommunications industry of two developing countries, Malaysia and Bangladesh. The research framework proposes relationships among organisational culture, operating core (innovation process, cross-functional organisation, and implementation of tools/technology), competition-informed pricing, and performance. A total of 176 usable data from both countries are analysed for the purpose of the research. The findings show that organisational culture tends to be more influential on innovation process and cross-functional organisation in Malaysian telecommunication industry. In contrast, implementation of tools/technology plays a more instrumental role in competition-informed pricing practices in Bangladesh. This study revealed few differences in the innovation management practices between two developing countries. The findings have strategic implications for the service sectors in both the developing countries regarding implementation of innovative enterprises, especially in Bangladesh where innovation is the basis for survival. Testing the innovation management practices in the developing countries perhaps contains uniqueness in the field of innovation management.
  3. Fulltext Method developments to extract proteins from oil palm chromoplast for proteomic analysis
    Lau BY, Deb-Choudhury S, Morton JD, Clerens S, Dyer JM, Ramli US
    Springerplus, 2015;4:791.
    PMID: 26702380 DOI: 10.1186/s40064-015-1576-4
    Proteins from the plant chromoplast are essential for many physiological processes such as fatty acid biosynthesis. Different protein extraction methods were tested to find the most robust method to obtain oil palm chromoplast proteins for mass spectrometry analysis. Initially, two different solvents were employed to reduce the fruit lipids. Then, two plant cell wall digestive enzymes were used to acquire the protoplasts to increase the protein extraction effectiveness. A two-stage centrifugation-based fractionation approach enhanced the number of identified proteins, particularly the fatty acid biosynthetic enzymes. The effectiveness of each extraction method was assessed using protein yields and 2DE gel profiles. The ideal method was successfully used to establish the 2DE chromoplast proteome maps of low and high oleic acid mesocarps of oil palm. Further nanoLC-MS/MS analysis of the extracted chromoplast proteins led to the identification of 162 proteins, including some of the main enzymes involved in the fatty acid biosynthesis. The established procedures would provide a solid foundation for further functional studies, including fatty acid biosynthetic expression profiling and evaluation of regulatory function.
  4. Fulltext A cross sectional study: the knowledge, attitude, perception, misconception and views (KAPMV) of adult family members of people living with human immune virus-HIV acquired immune deficiency syndrome-AIDS (PLWHA)
    Bhagavathula AS, Bandari DK, Elnour AA, Ahmad A, Khan MU, Baraka M, et al.
    Springerplus, 2015;4:769.
    PMID: 26688783 DOI: 10.1186/s40064-015-1541-2
    We intended to assess knowledge, attitude, perception, misconception and views (KAP-MV) of family members of PLWHA. A cross-sectional retrospective study conducted in Anti-retroviral centre of Mahatma Gandhi Memorial-MGM hospital, Warangal, Telangana, South-India from July to September 2014. A questionnaire containing 41 items was distributed among adult family members accompanying patients living with HIV/AIDS-PLWHA. Level of KAP-MV was categorized into poor (0-28), average (29-55) and good (56-82). Analysis was performed by Pearson's Chi square, analysis of variance and Spearman's correlation test on 41 variables using SPSS version 21 and p 
  5. Fulltext The development and validation of a test of science critical thinking for fifth graders
    Mapeala R, Siew NM
    Springerplus, 2015;4:741.
    PMID: 26640753 DOI: 10.1186/s40064-015-1535-0
    The paper described the development and validation of the Test of Science Critical Thinking (TSCT) to measure the three critical thinking skill constructs: comparing and contrasting, sequencing, and identifying cause and effect. The initial TSCT consisted of 55 multiple choice test items, each of which required participants to select a correct response and a correct choice of critical thinking used for their response. Data were obtained from a purposive sampling of 30 fifth graders in a pilot study carried out in a primary school in Sabah, Malaysia. Students underwent the sessions of teaching and learning activities for 9 weeks using the Thinking Maps-aided Problem-Based Learning Module before they answered the TSCT test. Analyses were conducted to check on difficulty index (p) and discrimination index (d), internal consistency reliability, content validity, and face validity. Analysis of the test-retest reliability data was conducted separately for a group of fifth graders with similar ability. Findings of the pilot study showed that out of initial 55 administered items, only 30 items with relatively good difficulty index (p) ranged from 0.40 to 0.60 and with good discrimination index (d) ranged within 0.20-1.00 were selected. The Kuder-Richardson reliability value was found to be appropriate and relatively high with 0.70, 0.73 and 0.92 for identifying cause and effect, sequencing, and comparing and contrasting respectively. The content validity index obtained from three expert judgments equalled or exceeded 0.95. In addition, test-retest reliability showed good, statistically significant correlations ([Formula: see text]). From the above results, the selected 30-item TSCT was found to have sufficient reliability and validity and would therefore represent a useful tool for measuring critical thinking ability among fifth graders in primary science.
  6. Fulltext A comprehensive review on privacy preserving data mining
    Aldeen YA, Salleh M, Razzaque MA
    Springerplus, 2015;4:694.
    PMID: 26587362 DOI: 10.1186/s40064-015-1481-x
    Preservation of privacy in data mining has emerged as an absolute prerequisite for exchanging confidential information in terms of data analysis, validation, and publishing. Ever-escalating internet phishing posed severe threat on widespread propagation of sensitive information over the web. Conversely, the dubious feelings and contentions mediated unwillingness of various information providers towards the reliability protection of data from disclosure often results utter rejection in data sharing or incorrect information sharing. This article provides a panoramic overview on new perspective and systematic interpretation of a list published literatures via their meticulous organization in subcategories. The fundamental notions of the existing privacy preserving data mining methods, their merits, and shortcomings are presented. The current privacy preserving data mining techniques are classified based on distortion, association rule, hide association rule, taxonomy, clustering, associative classification, outsourced data mining, distributed, and k-anonymity, where their notable advantages and disadvantages are emphasized. This careful scrutiny reveals the past development, present research challenges, future trends, the gaps and weaknesses. Further significant enhancements for more robust privacy protection and preservation are affirmed to be mandatory.
  7. Fulltext Barriers to breast self examination practice among Malaysian female students: a cross sectional study
    Akhtari-Zavare M, Juni MH, Ismail IZ, Said SM, Latiff LA
    Springerplus, 2015;4:692.
    PMID: 26587360 DOI: 10.1186/s40064-015-1491-8
    Breast cancer is the most frequent cancer and the second reason of cancer deaths among woman worldwide, including Malaysia. The objective of this paper is to assess the practice of breast self-examination (BSE) and identify the barriers of BSE practice among undergraduate female students in Malaysia.
  8. Fulltext The perceptions of pre-service and in-service teachers regarding a project-based STEM approach to teaching science
    Siew NM, Amir N, Chong CL
    Springerplus, 2015;4:8.
    PMID: 25674494 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-4-8
    Whilst much attention has focused on project-based approaches to teaching Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects, little has been reported on the views of South-East Asian science teachers on project-based STEM approaches. Such knowledge could provide relevant information for education training institutions on how to influence innovative teaching of STEM subjects in schools. This article reports on a study that investigated the perceptions of 25 pre-service and 21 in-service Malaysian science teachers in adopting an interdisciplinary project-based STEM approach to teaching science. The teachers undertook an eight hour workshop which exposed them to different science-based STEM projects suitable for presenting science content in the Malaysian high school science syllabus. Data on teachers' perceptions were captured through surveys, interviews, open-ended questions and classroom discussion before and at the end of the workshop. Study findings showed that STEM professional development workshops can provide insights into the support required for teachers to adopt innovative, effective, project-based STEM approaches to teaching science in their schools.
  9. Fulltext Underwater image quality enhancement through composition of dual-intensity images and Rayleigh-stretching
    Abdul Ghani AS, Mat Isa NA
    Springerplus, 2014;3:757.
    PMID: 25674483 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-757
    The quality of underwater image is poor due to the properties of water and its impurities. The properties of water cause attenuation of light travels through the water medium, resulting in low contrast, blur, inhomogeneous lighting, and color diminishing of the underwater images. This paper proposes a method of enhancing the quality of underwater image. The proposed method consists of two stages. At the first stage, the contrast correction technique is applied to the image, where the image is applied with the modified Von Kries hypothesis and stretching the image into two different intensity images at the average value with respects to Rayleigh distribution. At the second stage, the color correction technique is applied to the image where the image is first converted into hue-saturation-value (HSV) color model. The modification of the color component increases the image color performance. Qualitative and quantitative analyses indicate that the proposed method outperforms other state-of-the-art methods in terms of contrast, details, and noise reduction.
  10. Fulltext Does psychological strengths and subjective well-being predicting parental involvement and problem solving among Malaysian and Indian students?
    Khan A, Ahmad R, Hamdan AR, Mustaffa MS, Tahir LM
    Springerplus, 2014;3:756.
    PMID: 25674482 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-756
    The present study examined the predictors of psychological strengths and subjective well-being for dealing with academic stress perceived by university engineering students. Sample of 400 Malaysian (N = 180 boys and N = 220 girls) age varies 18 to 25 years and 400 Indian students (N = 240 boys and N = 160 girls) age varies 18 to 25 years from public universities were participated. Quantitative method was used for data analysis. Findings shows that gender, religiosity and socioeconomic status are significantly influencing psychological strengths and subjective well-being of both Indian and Malaysian students. Findings also revealed that parental involvement and problem solving coping styles were significantly predicting psychological strengths and subjective well-being among both countries participants. Findings of the current study provide the insight for the educators, and parents dealing with adolescents.
  11. Fulltext ASTER, ALI and Hyperion sensors data for lithological mapping and ore minerals exploration
    Beiranvand Pour A, Hashim M
    Springerplus, 2014;3:130.
    PMID: 25674434 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-130
    This paper provides a review of the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER), Advanced Land Imager (ALI), and Hyperion data and applications of the data as a tool for ore minerals exploration, lithological and structural mapping. Spectral information extraction from ASTER, ALI, and Hyperion data has great ability to assist geologists in all disciplines to map the distribution and detect the rock units exposed at the earth's surface. The near coincidence of Earth Observing System (EOS)/Terra and Earth Observing One (EO-1) platforms allows acquiring ASTER, ALI, and Hyperion imagery of the same ground areas, resulting accurate information for geological mapping applications especially in the reconnaissance stages of hydrothermal copper and gold exploration, chromite, magnetite, massive sulfide and uranium ore deposits, mineral components of soils and structural interpretation at both regional and district scales. Shortwave length infrared and thermal infrared bands of ASTER have sufficient spectral resolution to map fundamental absorptions of hydroxyl mineral groups and silica and carbonate minerals for regional mapping purposes. Ferric-iron bearing minerals can be discriminated using six unique wavelength bands of ALI spanning the visible and near infrared. Hyperion visible and near infrared bands (0.4 to 1.0 μm) and shortwave infrared bands (0.9 to 2.5 μm) allowed to produce image maps of iron oxide minerals, hydroxyl-bearing minerals, sulfates and carbonates in association with hydrothermal alteration assemblages, respectively. The techniques and achievements reviewed in the present paper can further introduce the efficacy of ASTER, ALI, and Hyperion data for future mineral and lithological mapping and exploration of the porphyry copper, epithermal gold, chromite, magnetite, massive sulfide and uranium ore deposits especially in arid and semi-arid territory.
  12. Fulltext Dynamic electronic institutions in agent oriented cloud robotic systems
    Nagrath V, Morel O, Malik A, Saad N, Meriaudeau F
    Springerplus, 2015;4:103.
    PMID: 25763310 DOI: 10.1186/s40064-015-0810-4
    The dot-com bubble bursted in the year 2000 followed by a swift movement towards resource virtualization and cloud computing business model. Cloud computing emerged not as new form of computing or network technology but a mere remoulding of existing technologies to suit a new business model. Cloud robotics is understood as adaptation of cloud computing ideas for robotic applications. Current efforts in cloud robotics stress upon developing robots that utilize computing and service infrastructure of the cloud, without debating on the underlying business model. HTM5 is an OMG's MDA based Meta-model for agent oriented development of cloud robotic systems. The trade-view of HTM5 promotes peer-to-peer trade amongst software agents. HTM5 agents represent various cloud entities and implement their business logic on cloud interactions. Trade in a peer-to-peer cloud robotic system is based on relationships and contracts amongst several agent subsets. Electronic Institutions are associations of heterogeneous intelligent agents which interact with each other following predefined norms. In Dynamic Electronic Institutions, the process of formation, reformation and dissolution of institutions is automated leading to run time adaptations in groups of agents. DEIs in agent oriented cloud robotic ecosystems bring order and group intellect. This article presents DEI implementations through HTM5 methodology.
  13. Fulltext Growth effect on liver fatty acid composition of damselfishes genus Abudefduf collected in coral reef habitats of the Malaysian South China Sea
    Arai T, Amalina R, Bachok Z
    Springerplus, 2015;4:71.
    PMID: 25713763 DOI: 10.1186/s40064-015-0862-5
    In order to understand feeding ecology, habitat use and migration of coral reef fish, fatty acid composition was examined in damselfish species Abudefduf bengalensis and A. sexfasciatus collected in the Malaysian South China Sea. Proportions of saturated fatty acids (SAFA) ranged from 49.5% to 74.2%, with the highest proportions in fatty acids, the second highest was monounsaturated fatty acids (MUFA) ranged from 21.4% to 47.4% and the proportion of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) was the lowest ranged from 3.1% to 6.0%. Palmitic acid (16:0) was the most common in SAFA, oleic acid (C18:1ω9c) was the dominant in MUFA and linolenic acid (C18:3n3) showed the highest proportion in PUFA. Fatty acid concentrations, especially in SAFA and MUFA, could be related to physiological condition, sexual development, and recent feeding events. The diet shift revealed by the fatty acid composition suggests changes in habitat use and migration scale in coral reef environment of genus Abudefduf.
  14. Fulltext Saudi high school students' attitudes and barriers toward the use of computer technologies in learning English
    Sabti AA, Chaichan RS
    Springerplus, 2014;3:460.
    PMID: 25187883 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-460
    This study examines the attitudes of Saudi Arabian high school students toward the use of computer technologies in learning English. The study also discusses the possible barriers that affect and limit the actual usage of computers. Quantitative approach is applied in this research, which involved 30 Saudi Arabia students of a high school in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The respondents comprised 15 males and 15 females with ages between 16 years and 18 years. Two instruments, namely, Scale of Attitude toward Computer Technologies (SACT) and Barriers affecting Students' Attitudes and Use (BSAU) were used to collect data. The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) of Davis (1989) was utilized. The analysis of the study revealed gender differences in attitudes toward the use of computer technologies in learning English. Female students showed high and positive attitudes towards the use of computer technologies in learning English than males. Both male and female participants demonstrated high and positive perception of Usefulness and perceived Ease of Use of computer technologies in learning English. Three barriers that affected and limited the use of computer technologies in learning English were identified by the participants. These barriers are skill, equipment, and motivation. Among these barriers, skill had the highest effect, whereas motivation showed the least effect.
  15. Fulltext Relationship between bases of power and job stresses: role of mentoring
    Lo MC, Thurasamy R, Liew WT
    Springerplus, 2014;3:432.
    PMID: 25157334 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-432
    Building upon the social exchange theory, this paper hypothesized the direct effect of bases of power on job stress with mentoring as moderator. Power bases and job stresses were conceptualized as 7- and 3- dimensional constructs, respectively. One hundred and ninety-five Malaysian managers and executives working in large-scale multinational companies participated in this study. The results have indicated that bases of power as possessed by supervisors have strong effect on employees' job stress and mentoring was found to have moderated the relationship between power bases and job stress. Implications of the findings, potential limitations of the study, and directions for future research were discussed further.
  16. Fulltext Solitary wave solutions of the fourth order Boussinesq equation through the exp(-Ф(η))-expansion method
    Akbar MA, Hj Mohd Ali N
    Springerplus, 2014;3:344.
    PMID: 25105084 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-344
    The exp(-Ф(η))-expansion method is an ascending method for obtaining exact and solitary wave solutions for nonlinear evolution equations. In this article, we implement the exp(-Ф(η))-expansion method to build solitary wave solutions to the fourth order Boussinesq equation. The procedure is simple, direct and useful with the help of computer algebra. By using this method, we obtain solitary wave solutions in terms of the hyperbolic functions, the trigonometric functions and elementary functions. The results show that the exp(-Ф(η))-expansion method is straightforward and effective mathematical tool for the treatment of nonlinear evolution equations in mathematical physics and engineering.
  17. Fulltext Do we protect freshwater eels or do we drive them to extinction?
    Arai T
    Springerplus, 2014;3:534.
    PMID: 25279325 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-534
    Freshwater eels are important animals because they have a unique catadromous life history and are used as food resources. European, American and Japanese eel populations now are considered to be outside the safe biological limits and are seriously threatened with extinction. Therefore, the European eel was recently categorised as critically endangered by the European Union and the United Nations. One of the reasons for the drastic decline in eel populations is overfishing, which has caused a high demand for eel aquaculture; eel aquaculture completely depends on wild juveniles, and in contrast to animals, artificial propagation has not yet succeeded for the eels. Therefore, commercial eel industries are now considering tropical eels as possible replacement for European and Japanese eels to compensate for declining stocks. In this study, I attempt to examine the present status of the biology and stock of tropical eels. However, useful scientific research and information on the biology and stock assessments of tropical eels are lacking, a situation quite different from that for other temperate freshwater eels, which have been well studied for several decades with trends and recruitment patterns being on record. Nevertheless, the present tropical eel catch has been reported as being less than half that of 20 years ago. The present trends in eel stocks and utilization for human consumption suggest that all eel populations will decline to numbers that fall outside safe biological limits and will be seriously threatened with extinction without protection and conservation from strict enforcement of local and international laws.
  18. Fulltext Formulation of Trichoderma sp. SL2 inoculants using different carriers for soil treatment in rice seedling growth
    Doni F, Isahak A, Che Mohd Zain CR, Mohd Ariffin S, Wan Mohamad WN, Wan Yusoff WM
    Springerplus, 2014;3:532.
    PMID: 25279323 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-532
    BACKGROUND: Trichoderma sp. SL2 has been previously reported to enhance rice germination, vigour, growth and physiological characteristics. The use of Potato Dextrose Agar as carrier of Trichoderma sp. SL2 inoculant is not practical for field application due to its short shelf life and high cost. This study focuses on the use of corn and sugarcane bagasse as potential carriers for Trichoderma sp. SL2 inoculants.

    FINDINGS: A completely randomized design was applied for this study. Trichoderma sp. SL2 suspension mixed with corn and sugarcane bagasse were used as treatment mixture in soil. Growth parameters including rice seedling height, root length, wet weight, leaf number and biomass were measured and compared to control. The results showed that Trichoderma sp. SL2 mixed with corn significantly enhanced rice seedlings root length, wet weight and biomass compared to Trichoderma sp. SL2 mixed with sugarcane bagasse and control.

    CONCLUSION: Corn can be a potential carrier for Trichoderma spp. inoculants for field application.

  19. Fulltext Oscillation theorems for second order nonlinear forced differential equations
    Salhin AA, Din UK, Ahmad RR, Noorani MS
    Springerplus, 2014;3:300.
    PMID: 25077054 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-300
    In this paper, a class of second order forced nonlinear differential equation is considered and several new oscillation theorems are obtained. Our results generalize and improve those known ones in the literature.
  20. Fulltext Are virtues national, supranational, or universal?
    van Oudenhoven JP, de Raad B, Timmerman ME, Askevis-Leherpeux F, Boski P, Carmona C, et al.
    Springerplus, 2014;3:223.
    PMID: 24855589 DOI: 10.1186/2193-1801-3-223
    Many studies investigated cultural differences in values, most notably by Hofstede and Schwarz. Relatively few have focused on virtues, a related and important concept in contemporary social science. The present paper examines the similarities and differences between nations, or blocks of - culturally related - nations on the perceived importance of virtues. Adults (N = 2.809 students) from 14 countries were asked to freely mention which virtues they found important to practice in daily life, and next to rate a list of 15 virtues, which reflect the most frequently mentioned categories in The Netherlands, as found in a previous study. The 14 nations included the United States, Mexico, nine European and three Asian nations. For the free-listed virtues, we compared the top-ten lists of most frequently mentioned virtues across the nations. We used a correspondence analysis on the frequency table to assess the relationships between the virtues and nations. For the 15 virtues ratings, a MANOVA, and follow-up ANOVA's were used to examine effects of nation, age, gender and religion. We found strong evidence for relationships between nations and blocks of culturally related nations and the importance attached to various virtues. There appear to be some country specific virtues, such as generosity in France, but also some relatively universal virtues, most notably honesty, respect, and kindness.
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