Development of a voice recognition based system to help physically disabled people use the facebook

Social network sites (SNSs) have become so popular that the number of people joining and actively participating on such sites is increasing on a daily basis. Although there are several SNSs, Facebook is currently the most popular and most commonly used. SNSs have primarily been developed with able-bodied people in mind and as a result of this, people with disabilities find it difficult to join and participate on these sites. Furthermore, this topic has received little attention by researchers around the world. Facebook pages usually consist of text, graphics, and sound where the users navigate through the pages using a mouse. As a step towards addressing this need and finding a possible elegant solution, the authors have developed a voice-activated PC-based system (called NEU-FACE) in the form of an interface to Facebook. With the aid of this system, a person with a physical disability can join and participate in Facebook by giving voice commands to manage the typical Facebook activities.

     

Examining Impact of Islamic Work Ethic on Task Performance: Mediating Effect of Psychological Capital and a Moderating Role of Ethical Leadership

The twenty-first century has seen an increase in ethical misconduct at the workplace, highlighting the need to stimulate discussion on the role of work ethics. The objective of the current study is to extend the literature on work ethics by examining the role of Islamic work ethic in enhancing the task performance of employees. The current study proposes that psychological capital mediates the relationship between Islamic work ethic and task performance. It is also proposed that ethical leadership might act as a boundary condition that boosts the positive relationship between Islamic work ethic and psychological capital. Data were collected in three-time lags from employees working in the service sector of Pakistan (N?=?218) through the questionnaire. The results supported the mediation and moderation hypothesis, confirming that psychological capital mediates the relationship between Islamic work ethic and task performance. Ethical leadership moderates the relationship between Islamic work ethic and psychological capital. The results offer implications for theory and practice. Limitations and future research directions are also discussed.

     

Foreign inflows and economic growth: An emiprical study of the SAARC region

The study examines and highlights the impact of selected foreign inflows (aid, trade, FDI, debt and remittances) on the economic growth of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries. The existent literature lacks a comprehensive analysis of the SAARC countries as countries like Afghanistan, Bhutan and the Maldives have largely been ignored due to the shorter time periods of available data. The study is empirical in nature and utilizes panel data techniques on macroeconomic data for the period 2008–2015. Foreign aid and foreign direct investment are found to impact economic growth positively. Foreign debt and trade flows are found to adversely affect economic growth. No relationship is established between the flow of remittances and the economic growth of these countries. The obtained results are robust to different proxy variables and the addition of macroeconomic variables. For the first time, the study provides policy implications based on the data of all SAARC countries. The study recommends focusing on increasing the inflows of resources in the form of aid and foreign direct investment (FDI) from the developed world to achieve higher economic growth.     

Characteristics and practices of “Christian-based” companies

There is a sizeable group of self-described Christian companies which have declared their belief in the successful merging of biblical principles with business activities. As these companies have become more visible, an increasing number of anecdotal newspaper and magazine articles about these companies have appeared. Surprisingly, no rigorous research has been conducted prior to our recent study. This article provides national estimates of the size and predominant characteristics of self-identified Christian companies. In addition, the study investigated the types of relationships these companies maintained with their employees, customers, communities, and suppliers.Nabil Ibrahim is an Assistant Professor of Business Administration at Augusta College, Augusta, Georgia. He has published articles, case studies, and professional papers in the areas of business policy and strategy.Dr. Leslie W. Rue is Professor of Management in the College of Business Administration at Georgia State University. He is the author of over forty articles, cases, and papers that have appeared in academic and practitioner journals. He has coauthored eight textbooks in the field of management.Dr. Patricia P. McDougall is an Assistant Professor of Management at Georgia State University. Her research focuses primarily on new venture strategies and international entrepreneurship and has been published in several academic journals. Dr. G. Robert Grenne is an Associate Professor of Management at Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia where he teaches strategic management and entrepreneurship. He is a Contributing Editor to Spiritual Fitness in Business and has published articles in various academic and practitioner journals.     

The Cost of Monopoly in Australian Manufacturing

This article looks at the deadweight loss arising from monopoly elements in Australian manufacturing under various assumptions and its relationship with the level of concentration.     

The Information Content of Dividend Initiations and Firm Size: An Analysis Using Bid-Ask Spreads

The bid-ask spread of stock prices is examined for a sample of dividend initiating firms. The average percentage and dollar bid-ask spreads increase significantly on the day preceding the Wall Street Journal Index announcement date, possibly reflecting, on average, the market maker's anticipatory uncertainty. The day -1 increase in spread is inversely associated with firm size, an information environment proxy, after considering the simultaneous effects of dividend yield, returns variance, dollar trading volume and share price. The average percentage spread declines significantly on day 0 from its day -1 level and remains lower, on average, over a 365 day post-announcement period than 90 day pre-announcement levels. Similar results are obtained for dollar spread averages. The post-announcement percentage spread decline suggests a resolution of uncertainty, and is positively associated with the dividend yield. Dividend initiation announcements appear to reduce informational asymmetry.     

A Multiple and Partial Wavelet Analysis of the Oil Price,Inflation, Exchange Rate,and Economic Growth Nexus in Saudi Arabia

This article provides a fresh insight into the dynamic nexus between oil prices, the Saudi/US dollar exchange rate, inflation, and output growth rate in Saudi Arabia’ economy, using novel Morlet’ wavelet methods. Specifically, it implements various tools of methodology: the continuous wavelet power spectrum, the cross-wavelet power spectrum, the wavelet coherency, the multiple and the partial wavelet coherence to the annual sample period 1969–2014. Our results unveil that the relationships among the variables evolve through time and frequency. From the time-domain view, we show strong but non-homogenous linkages between the four variables. From the frequency-domain view, we uncover significant wavelet coherences and strong lead-lag relationships. From an economic view, the wavelet analysis shows that Saudi economy is still exposed to several global risk factors, which are mainly related to the oil market volatility, and the pegging of the local currency to the US dollar. Such risk factors strongly and negatively affect the real economic growth, exert more pressure on inflation, and substantially limit the freedom to pursue an independent monetary policy.     

Remittance,Institutions and Investment Volatility Interactions: An Intercontinental Analysis

Generating massive investment for growth and development has been one of the main policy goals of most economies around the globe. Countries, most especially developing ones, are highly susceptible to investment volatility owing largely to the fragile nature of their economies as well as weaknesses in terms of dysfunctional institutions. Therefore, sound economic management suggests the need to better understand possible sources for mitigating the adverse effects of investment volatility. Remittances have been identified as important capital flows which do a good job of dousing macroeconomic volatilities. It is on this basis that the study sought to uncover the causal relationship between remittances and investment volatility via the intermediating role of institutions. Using a panel of 70 countries and the system Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimator, three insightful outcomes come to the fore. First, remittances played countercyclical roles across the estimated regressions. Second, institutional quality had no significant role in mitigating investment volatility and lastly, the interactive terms of both remittances and institutions significantly mitigated the negative impacts of investment volatility with the exception of the political component of the institutional architecture. Policy suggestions are drawn based on our results.