This research aims to investigate the relation between financial ratios and stock prices of technology industry in Thailand using simple Pearson correlation and multiple regression analysis. The financial ratios using in this research are financial liquidity, assets efficiency, profitability, solvency, and firm value. The closing price of each year is used in examination. This research is performed by using 110 samples during the period of 2012 to 2016.
The result shows that Return of Equity ratio, and Earnings per share are significantly positive related to market stock price of technology industry. That means if these financial ratios are positive, the stock price will be positive too. However, dent to equity ratio and returns on assets are significantly negative related to stock price.

This research aimed to study the quality of financial statements of small and medium enterprises in the view of tax auditors by gender, age, education level and experience in inspection. Sample population was 117 tax auditors using the questionnaire as a research tool. The statistics used in the research were percentage, mean, standard deviation, and variance. The results showed that most of the respondents were 94 female, 80.30%, aged from 41 to 50 years old, and had experience in audit and certification of financial statements from 11 to 15 years, 93 people. Quality of the financial statements of small and medium enterprises in the view of the tax auditor was Understandable, Decision-making, Reliability, and Comparison. There was no difference in age and experience in inspection. However, there was difference if classified by gender.

TCEO compensation practices in the banking industry are widely believed to have induced excessive risk-taking and, thus, to have played an important role in causing the recent financial crisis. The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS) has called attention to the need to understand, and improve the corporate governance of financial organizations. The purpose of this study is to analyze whether there is a mechanism in boards that may have impacts on the relationship between CEO incentive compensation and risk-taking behavior for the banking industry. The mechanism this study proposes is the compensation/audit committee overlap (hereafter, director overlap). In this study, the results show that in the banking industry, director overlap affects the risk incentive resulting from CEO incentive compensation; director overlap can reduce the relationship between CEO incentive compensation and default risk; and director overlap reduces the relationship between CEO incentive compensation and systematic risk, instead of idiosyncratic risk. These findings indicate that director overlap between compensation committee and audit committee can help risk management by reducing risk-taking behavior inducing by CEO incentive compensation, reducing default probability inducing by CEO risk-taking behavior and systematic risk.

This research aimed to grasp the contextualized concept of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in Oman Medical Specialty Board (OMSB). The primary objectives of this research were to explore the level of CSR engagement at OMSB, to explore CSR benefits, to explore CSR impact on OMSB performance, reputation and competitiveness, and finally to explore employees‟ attitudes and perceptions towards CSR. A convenient sample of 120 employees was asked with a standardized questionnaire. The data were analyzed using mixed methods. The study findings have indicated that there was a general lack of CSR initiatives at OMSB. However, findings have acknowledged the benefits of CSR, the positive relationship between CSR and performance, and the positive employees‟ attitudes towards CSR. Several valuable strategies and recommendations have been suggested for making a great difference in OMSB by promoting CSR practices.

Employee engagement has gained popularity over the past years. It became a very popular managerial construct. I strongly agreed that Employee engagement is the key source of organization’s competitive advantages and high performance. Several literatures highlighted the impact of employee engagement on organization’s performance. Therefore, we noted that most organizations use different engagement building tools to sustain their competitive advantages and improve the performance. The overarching aim of this research is to attempt to find out what encourages employees at my work place “Oman Medical Specialty Board” to have a passion for the job they do, which encourages them to display discretionary effort thus going the extra mile to do their job to the very best of their ability. Also, as the new strategic plan of OMSB considers employees engagement as one of its objectives, therefore this research will be a good starting point to achieve this objective and for sure it will add value to OMSB. In fact, the generation and harnessing of high employee engagement has been link to high levels of individual performance as well as increased organizational financial performance. Therefore, this research is an exploratory study that aims to measure the current levels of engagement within OMSB, to identify the key drivers of employee engagement, to examine the employees’ attitude toward engagement strategy and to study the impact of employee engagement on job performance which is directly affecting other dimensions like employees’ satisfaction and organizational commitment and performance. To achieve these objectives and to answers the research questions, a survey questionnaire was developed and validated. The findings of this research were presented in mean and standard deviation in addition to other calculated elements. The result showed that OMSB has high engagement level and the employees have high attitude toward this strategy. Also, findings showed that OMSB should take attention regarding some engagement drivers within the organization to sustain and improve its performance. Several recommendations for improvements that would enhance the organization’s employee engagement level have been suggested. Additionally, this study is very important catalyst to explore the area further. This is so because it will require future work and further research after this body of work has been completed as it is suggested in the “Future Work” part in the paper.

This paper investigated the influencing elements for the global competitiveness of firms in exporting. In order to achieve this purpose the paper reviews the export related literature and critically evaluates the effect of the Internet in exporting. The understanding gained in this in-depth review has led to suggest that the functions of the managers and their ability to interact with environmental factors of these small firms, which carry the potential to influence the performance of firms, is vital. Literature highlights the importance of relationships to small firms where mutual-understanding adding value to the exporter-importer relationships to overcome their difficulties and disadvantages. The manager‟s commitment seems vital in developing this relationship. The potential factors which carry the converging effect that would nourish the relationship between the exporter-importer leading to strengthening their mutual-trust have been discussed. In-depth review of the literature helped to gain clear insights of the benefits of the Internet for exporting firms. However this review led to questions about whether such benefits are fully applicable to small firms exporting from developed to developing market situation, highlighting the vital role of social relationships to the success of these firms. Thus it is worth investigating to observe whether comprehensive benefits of the Internet could be given to exporting firms through full implementation of this technology.© 2017 The Authors. Published by Global Illuminators. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license.

Over the past few decades, shift-share analysis is widely applied to explore the sources of local economic growth; however, there is little agreement as to the law of comparative advantage (CA) due to questions arising from spatial and industrial overlapping. The purpose of this paper is to exclude all overlapping biases to generate a new identity, which can fully show the concept of externalities and CA, the nation-industry-region interactions and the structural change of local industry in a timely manner. Finally, the usefulness of classical shift-share analysis faces serious challenges, especially for the high degree of geographical and industrial concentrations characterizing China’s regional economy from 1978-2008.

In this study, seven types of first-order and one-variable grey ordinary differential equation model (abbreviated as GM (1, 1) model) were constructed to predict the number of casualties for drunk-driving traffic accidents in Taiwan. Their predicting performance was also compared. All statistical values revealed that the predicting performance of GM (1, 1, x(0)), GM (1, 1, a), and GM (1, 1, b) outperformed other GM (1, 1) models. The minimum mean absolute percentage error and the highest correlational coefficient were 30.95 % and 0.96, respectively when predicting the number of death persons. When predicting the number of injury persons, all statistical values revealed that the predicting performance of GM (1, 1, x(0)), GM (1, 1, a), and GM (1, 1, b) outperformed other GM (1, 1) models. The minimum mean absolute percentage error and the highest correlational coefficient were 13.70 % and 0.96, respectively. According to the results, it revealed that GM (1, 1) was an efficient tool to predict the number of casualties for drunk-driving traffic accidents.

In response to the global urbanization, the World Health Organization (WHO) began promoting the Healthy City vision in 1981. Looking at the status quo of healthy cities, the current implementation of a healthy city is still undergoing a conceptual elaboration as a whole. It is because the conditions and characteristics of each place are different from those of the local culture. It can also be seen that the process of achieving a healthy city lies in its focus. However, as Taiwan’s society faces a process of rapid urbanization, it has also started to actively promote low-carbon cities and build mass transit facilities in the hope of responding to urban development issues such as global warming and slowing down environmental pollution. However, most of the construction of Taiwan’s rapid transit facilities involves land With the development of the type of development-oriented transportation (ie, guided by market demand), where the development is going and where public works are carried out, the population driven by it is not the living environment and the pedestrian environment Certainly suitable for living health. Accordingly, this study explores Transit-Oriented-Development (TOD), a healthy community formed by four stations of Taipei MRT Bannan Line: Jiangzicui Station, Xinpu Station, Banciao Station and Fuchu Station Environment as an example, we use Fuzzy Delphi Method (FDM) and Analytic Network Process (ANP), and import Gray System Theory to construct TOD healthy community by Gray-ANP analysis Walk friendly environmental assessment index system, by using index gray weighted value to assess the TOD walk friendly environmental level and priority order, with a view to measuring environmental indicators from healthy walking friendly environment, view the environmental differences caused by uneven distribution of local resources to understand the public walking behavior patterns The cognitive gap with the environment.

To prevent mobile application failures, increasing and maintaining user satisfaction is a significant issue. Therefore, it is important to identify the mobile application features that users are interested in. It can be obtained from user reviews on the app store. As a result, user reviews have been studied by many researchers to provide information about the features of the app for developers. Although some research has been carried out on mobile application reviews, there have been few empirical investigations into cross-country differences in the mobile application reviews. In response, this paper proposes a framework for comparative analysis of mobile application features that users of South Korea, the United States, and Japan are interested in. Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA), one of the topic modeling techniques, which extracts topic from the reviews and identify the topic composition of the documents are applied. The proposed approach can serve to help developers improve the target feature, benchmark competing apps and provide insight into user characteristics of the country when launching and updating apps in other countries.

This study takes an auto ethnographic approach, narrating the coming-to-consciousness of an American teacher who realized a paradigm shift in teaching practices as a result of a cultural awakening. From this event, the author posits and explicated the need for culturally relevant teacher leadership, describing what such leadership “looks” like and how it can be developed in ways that prove beneficial for student learning. Data analysis methods include content analysis and coding, and literature reviewed is centred upon the framework of culturally relevant pedagogy. The study concludes that culturally relevant dispositions – which are in turn powered by “wonkiness” – are the foundation for equitable teaching and learning.

The purpose of this study was to identify the psychometric properties of a Readiness for Knowledge Management Implementation Questionnaire (RKMIQ) administered to State Audit Institution (SAI) Employees. This study explored the level of readiness for knowledge management (KM) process implementation in SAI.. The dimensional structure of the questionnaire was investigated with a sample of 170 SAI employees (70% males and 30% females). Based on factor analysis results, the questionnaire emphasized sixteen factors categorized in five themes: organization culture, organization structure, information technology (IT) infrastructure, employees’ acceptance of KM, and employees’ intention to be involved in the KM process. The internal consistency and concurrent validity of RKMIQ were verified (Cronbach’s alpha= 0.95). RKMIQ and its factors were significantly correlated with factors influencing the KM initiatives questionnaire (FIKMIQ). Testing of the reliability of RKMIQ using Test-Re-Test method revealed a significant correlation of (0.96) between the two applications. This questionnaire was proved to be relatively reliable and valid. The results showed that SAI is ready for KM process implementation. Since it is essential to assess organizational readiness for KM before embarking on KM initiatives, this study designed an instrument that brings together organizational and human factors influencing the readiness of organizations for KM. The comprehensiveness of the instrument, as well as the degree of validity and reliability that it demonstrated, justifies its adoption to measure the readiness of organizations to implement KM processes.

Independent music is regarded as an artistic and cultural activity with grassroots and subculture connotations, and its value improves the visibility of the local cultural ecology and demonstrates linkages between society and the creation of music. Musical performances have characteristics as both products and services, and performers use musical performances to provide sensory experiences to the audience. Because the audience enjoys the atmosphere of the performance and interaction with the performers, its members derive greater enjoyment than they would by simply listening to the music. This paper applies service design research methodologies combined with core modes of thinking related to experience economy and creative marketing. Given the preconditions of utilizing few resources and maintaining their unique characteristics, the aim of this study is to find new types of business concepts and marketing models for emerging Taiwanese independent musicians or groups to promote their brand and optimize their performance services. This paper is based on a literature review, in-depth interviews, and practical observations; service design methods were used to conduct research affinity diagrams to clarify the role of service providers in the service process. Finally, contact points are used to analyze and summarize things that can be improved or produced as a result of the implementation of creative design. The research outcomes of this study include the following: helping research subjects re-establish their brand image and marketing media and providing plans for improving research participants’ performance service processes.

This research is intended to foster positive appreciation toward the use of picture story book of elementary school students, as an effort to improve the quality of learning that gives a sense of calm, comfort and pleasant pleasure for students during the learning process. Specifically this study aims to: (1) to know the perceptions of teachers and principals on the use of picture books, (2) to grow the desire of teachers and principals in making picture books. The approach used in this research is Research and Development (R & D). Research subjects were teachers, principals, students, school committees, elements of the Education Office, selected by cluster sampling area. The first years research has produced a pictorial book product and then into the second years study of need assessment, teacher capacity building, school principals and school committees. The data collection techniques used were questionnaires, observations, interviews and focus group discussion (FGD). The data were analyzed descriptively qualitative. The second year research results obtained data on the condition of the 60 Elementary School selected as a place of study, as follows. (1) The sixty elementary schools assessed, it shows that there are some who have the ability and desire to make their own picture book and some have not grown desire in making picture books. (2) FGD results indicate the desire and ability of teachers in designing picture story books has grown despite the various limitations. The teacher’s interest in designing his own picture story book hits the limitations of publishing access and knowledge of the book publishing flow. (3) Learning picture book should be given in an integrated manner with the study of Natural Sciences (IPA).

This study proposes an innovative approach to value American options. Using a portfolio of binary power options to replicate the early exercise premium, we modify Medvedev and Scaillet (2010) to derive an analytical approximation of American option values under the Black-Scholes framework. Compared with Medvedev and Scaillet (2010), our approach provides a much simpler functional form of the early exercise premium that can be easily extended to high-order series expansions. The numerical results show that the pricing performance of our method is closely comparable to that of Medvedev and Scaillet (2010) and superior to that of Barone-Adesi and Whaley (1987).

Organic inhibitor become alternative protection of corrosion because biodegradable, cheap and also environmental friendly. In this study to evaluate the performance of tobacco leaf extract and imidazoline commercial inhibitor in a sweet environment. This study used AISI 1045 carbon steel, with variation in pH 4 and pH 7, flow rate 7,85 cm/s and 13,09 cm/s and NaCl 3.5% medium. for both used some testing, FTIR, XRD, Weight loss, Polarization and Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS). Only for the tobacco leaf extract the addition of a GC-FID method. For the tobacco showed GC-FID method test nicotine levels of total extract is 2.65% and in weight loss testing has lowest corrosion rate in pH 4 with flow rate 7.85 cm/s, in concentration of inhibitor 265 ppm is 0.327 mmpy and efficiency 74.686%. While pH 7, flow rate 7.85 cm/s with concentration 132,5 ppm has corrosion rate 0.091 mmpy and efficiency 86.512%. XRD testing found FeCO3 compound as corrosion product. Tobacco inhibitor made thin layer in surface of steel which formed complex compound [Fe(NH3)6]2+ hence can protect surface and decrease corrosion rate. For imidazoline inhibitor based on weight loss testing, the highest value of efficiency inhibitor in 200 ppm with flow rate 7,85 cm/s at the pH 4 is 82.59% has low corrosion rate 0.104 mmpy. While at pH 7 the highest efficiency 92.697% in 100 ppm concentration of inhibitor and flow rate 7,85 cm/s with low corrosion rate 0.037 mmpy. XRD testing showed Fe24N10 compound formed by the reaction that occurs between Fe and the pyridine nitrogen atom. And for both inhibitor FTIR testing showed functional group of inhibitors precipitated to sample when immersed and EIS testing showed that the addition of the inhibitor concentration, can increase the value of polarization resistance to the solution and the value of (constant phase element) declined.

This study aimed to apply altmetrics tools to measure readers‟ intentions towards the highly cited contents in the field of information security among specific types of scholarly documents and therefore investigate the correlation between the citations (Bibiliometrics) and readers‟ intentions (Altmetrics) for each type of scholarly document. To achieve study objectives, the researchers used Scopus database to find out the highest productive types of documents publishing in the field of information security in the period (2014-2015) – since this period considered as a valid period for the scholarly production to be available in the full text and therefore to take the right to use and cite, as well as to be used and interacted through different social media channels-. Conferences papers, articles, and books chapters were the most productive types of scholarly documents. The first 20 of highly cited scholarly contents from each document types were chosen to be analyzed for measuring the readers‟ intention. The results reveal that articles were the most types of documents that gained the highest number of citations, followed by conferences papers and book chapters. As articles gained the highest number of citations, they gained also the highest number of readers‟ intentions. This is an expected result because citations and intentions are affected by each other. The type of document affected the correlation. The statistical results reveal that the significant correlation between citations and attentions was for the articles. Articles gained the highest citations and readers‟ intentions.

In recent years, the somatosensory technology has been used widely in the game industry. Moreover, it is also used widely for the purpose of rehabilitation, motion capture, input/output interfaces, and so on. Meanwhile the development and application of VR and AR have also become a hot trend. In many scenes of virtual reality environments or movies, a large number of plants often appear to present a natural landscape. In the field of Computer Graphics, Lindenmayer system — or L-system for short — is the mainstream method of simulating the growth of plants. The L-system is a parallel rewriting system which consists of axiom, the number of iteration, angle and production rules.
In this paper, we integrate the motion-capture technique of Kinect 2, the plant growth simulation of L-system, and Unity to implement a somatosensory Edutainment System. This system provides users interesting and interactive experience of growing plants in real-time. The user can swing his/her body to control the virtual tree growth in the beginning. After that, the virtual tree will swing its branches as user did, just like the Ents in the fantasy world. Finally, user can wear HTC VIVE HMD to observe their own generated trees. We look forward to increasing users’ awareness and care about the environment through our system.

LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) is one of the radio access technology standards developed by the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP), and it is also the most popular standard of 4G mobile communications technology at present. In order to extend the coverage area and provide higher transmission rates for users at the cell edge, the idea of Relay Node (RN) was proposed in LTE-A. On the other hand, two duplex modes are defined in LTE-A, namely frequency division duplex (FDD) and time division duplex (TDD), for transmission in both the uplink (UL) and downlink (DL) directions. In this paper, dynamic TDD configuration for Type-1 inband RN is addressed. Four schemes under top-down and bottom-up strategies are proposed to select a proper configuration for the backhaul link and the access links. Simulation study demonstrates the benefit of the top-down schemes in terms of higher throughput than bottom-up schemes as well as the contrast scheme of random selection.

When nitrogen presents in the nature, there are many oxidation states. If nitrogen with different oxidation states is discharged into river, negative environmental effects will occur. Therefore, in this study, the artificial neural network (ANN) was used to explore the effects of land use pattern on total nitrogen (TN) in Taiwan’s river basins. At first, 22 river basins with more complete data were selected for correlational analysis of TN and land use patterns to determine the land use pattern with significant effect. Subsequently, the significant land use patterns with higher correlational coefficients were used as the input variables to train the ANN. The results indicated that ANN could predict the TN concentrations well.