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Article
Publication date: 21 January 2019

Giulio Lancioni, Nirbhay Singh, Mark O’Reilly, Jeff Sigafoos, Fiora D’Amico, Dominga Laporta, Antonella Scordamaglia and Katia Pinto

Music stimulation is considered beneficial for people with advanced Alzheimer’s disease. The purpose of this paper is to assess a tablet-based program to promote music-related…

Abstract

Purpose

Music stimulation is considered beneficial for people with advanced Alzheimer’s disease. The purpose of this paper is to assess a tablet-based program to promote music-related hand responses and positive engagement (e.g. singing or moving the body with the music) in people with advanced Alzheimer’s disease.

Design/methodology/approach

The program was implemented with 20 participants according to a non-concurrent multiple baseline design across participants. The participants were provided with a tablet whose screen worked as a sensor. During the intervention, sensor activations by hand responses led the tablet to present 10 s segments of preferred songs; an absence of sensor activation led the tablet to produce a prompt.

Findings

The participants’ mean frequencies of hand responses (i.e. sensor activations) per 5 min session increased from mostly zero during baseline to between about 9 and 20 during the intervention. The mean percentages of observation intervals with participants’ positive engagement increased from 0 to 12 during the baseline to between 13 and 55 during the intervention. The differences between baseline and intervention data were statistically significant for all participants.

Originality/value

A tablet-based program, such as that used in this study, may help people with advanced Alzheimer’s disease develop specific music-related responses and positive engagement.

Details

Journal of Enabling Technologies, vol. 13 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2398-6263

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 18 September 2017

Giulio Lancioni, Nirbhay Singh, Mark O’Reilly, Jeff Sigafoos, Fiora D’Amico, Katia Pinto, Floriana De Vanna and Alessandro Caffò

Persons with mild and moderate Alzheimer’s disease experience increasing activity engagement failures, with consequent cognitive, social, and physical drawbacks. The purpose of…

Abstract

Purpose

Persons with mild and moderate Alzheimer’s disease experience increasing activity engagement failures, with consequent cognitive, social, and physical drawbacks. The purpose of this paper is to assess a technology-aided program to help these persons to independently start and carry out daily activities at the appropriate times.

Design/methodology/approach

The program was implemented with eight participants according to an adapted non-concurrent multiple baseline design across participants. The program provided each participant with: timely reminders about the activities to carry out, verbal instructions about the activity steps, and brief encouragements and praise.

Findings

All participants showed improvement during the program, that is, they managed to independently start the activities at the scheduled times and perform those activities with satisfactory levels of accuracy (i.e. with mean percentages of correct steps nearing or exceeding 90).

Originality/value

A technology-aided program, such as that used in this study, may help persons with mild and moderate Alzheimer disease engage in daily activities, with possible benefits for their cognitive functioning, social image, and physical condition.

Details

Journal of Enabling Technologies, vol. 11 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2398-6263

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 29 March 2013

Dezhi Wu and Katia Passerini

The purpose of this research is to investigate individual perceptions of time and time management strategies that professionals utilize to achieve their productivity in the…

5419

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this research is to investigate individual perceptions of time and time management strategies that professionals utilize to achieve their productivity in the execution of their daily tasks, projects and routines. Projects have specific time durations from the beginning to the end, which often need to be broken down into smaller temporal elements (e.g. milestones), and require learning and knowledge capture throughout different project phases. It aims to observe how knowledge management processes tie to personal time management, and how this observation could contribute to project management practices in organizations. The understanding of individual time management strategies, especially when they are connected to the capture, storage, transfer and application of knowledge, can create operational efficiencies in projects.

Design/methodology/approach

Two sets of in‐depth semi‐structured interviews and field observations were designed and conducted with 20 busy professionals at an academic institution in the USA. All interviews were audio‐taped and transcribed generating over 350 pages of individual time management strategy statements. An extensive content analysis was performed to categorize the types of knowledge being used by professionals when engaged in daily organizational tasks and projects based on their roles and job hierarchy. Alavi and Leidner's knowledge taxonomies were used as the main coding scheme in order to classify types of individual temporal behaviours uncovered in this study.

Findings

This study shows that both explicit and tacit practices of individual time management are an important component of how professionals complete project tasks within their daily routines. Project managers play an important role in leading a successful project, and their time orientations directly affect all project phases.

Originality/value

Although good time management strategies may be one of the key determinants of organizational productivity (driving increased output per unit of time), limited knowledge management research has been conducted within the context of professionals' time management practices. The findings reveal that individual time management is shaped by organizational temporal structures and norms, which organizations use to govern their employees and resources around clock time.

Details

International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, vol. 6 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1753-8378

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 28 March 2024

Jacqueline da Silva Deolindo

In our studies of daily newspapers and news websites in small and medium-sized cities in Brazil, we view these enterprises as firms endowed with specific strengths and weaknesses…

Abstract

In our studies of daily newspapers and news websites in small and medium-sized cities in Brazil, we view these enterprises as firms endowed with specific strengths and weaknesses reflecting the characteristics of the localities in which they operate. In addition, we use references from urban geography and the industrial economy to investigate their structure, conduct, and performance. This chapter presents our observations about the structure of these firms and the journalistic business in non-metropolitan cities of the State of Rio de Janeiro. The results point to greater consolidation of newspapers, despite their traditional way of operating; the low performance of news websites and their restricted source of revenue; and the existence of a potential regional market little explored by these media.

Details

Geo Spaces of Communication Research
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80071-606-3

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 9 January 2007

Katia Kouzi and Mohamed Saïd Naït‐Saïd

This work proposes a method to improve the estimation performance at standstill and low speed operations of an adaptive fuzzy logic speed‐sensorless field‐oriented control of an…

Abstract

Purpose

This work proposes a method to improve the estimation performance at standstill and low speed operations of an adaptive fuzzy logic speed‐sensorless field‐oriented control of an induction motor.

Design/methodology/approach

First, the speed estimation algorithm presented in Tursini et al., which it has been designed to consider constant speed operation, is modified in an attempt to reduce the estimation error. Second, the speed regulation by fuzzy logic controller (FLC) with fuzzy adapted gains (FAG) is proposed for speed regulation. The main features of the proposed algorithm are investigated and compared with those of the algorithm of (Tursini) considering different dynamic operating conditions.

Findings

Simulation results clearly show the performance of the proposed algorithm.

Originality/value

The proposed scheme is recommended for applications requiring robust speed control and field‐orientation even in the presence of some key parameter deviations.

Details

COMPEL - The international journal for computation and mathematics in electrical and electronic engineering, vol. 26 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0332-1649

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 30 November 2022

Antonin Cohen

The trajectory of François Perroux across the Vichy regime poses about all possible range of methodological issues to the historian of ideas: individual versus collective…

Abstract

The trajectory of François Perroux across the Vichy regime poses about all possible range of methodological issues to the historian of ideas: individual versus collective biography, ideational versus ideological reading, internal versus external analysis, etc. The chapter outlines key elements about Perroux’s trajectory showing the entanglements and boundaries of science and politics in the transition from democratic to authoritarian rule and vice versa. A particular emphasis on uncertainties and adjustments shows, against the tendency to a teleological explanation induced by a linear interpretation of his career, that different paths were considered by Perroux, but that his choices were nevertheless constrained by the forces of both the scientific and political fields.

Details

Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology: Including a Symposium on the Work of François Perroux
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80382-715-5

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 5 September 2016

Lavagnon A. Ika and Jonas Söderlund

The purpose of this paper is to review and analyze Albert Hirschman’s landmark book Development Projects Observed, share its insights for managing big projects, discuss its…

1128

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to review and analyze Albert Hirschman’s landmark book Development Projects Observed, share its insights for managing big projects, discuss its theoretical implications and how it may contribute to the current understanding of project behavior, project management (PM), and in what way it may encourage the rethinking of PM.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is based on an in-depth analysis of Hirschman’s book. The paper draws on the writings of Jeremy Adelman who authored Hirschman’s biography, Cass Sunstein and Michele Alacevich who, respectively, wrote the foreword and afterword of the Brookings Institution classic published in 2014. It also profits from the work of Robert Picciotto who first met Hirschman in 1964, and Bent Flyvbjerg who recently offered a test of validity for Hirschman’s “Hiding Hand” principle.

Findings

Albert Hirschman was an original thinker and, the authors argue in many ways, a father of PM scholarship. His ideas had profound implications for social sciences and lasting influence in academy, policy, and practice. Although, to a great extent based on studies of projects, his ideas have had surprisingly little impact on modern writings of PM. This paper contributes to amending this weakness in current literature on PM. The authors identify in Hirschman’s book a set of core ideas that possess analytical power for explaining problems in contemporary PM. They include the principle of the Hiding Hand, the power of context, the role of complexity and uncertainty, the unexpected project effects, project traits, and latitudes/disciplines. For all his work and way of research, the authors conclude that Hirschman is not only an early behavioral theorist in PM but equally an early rethinker of PM.

Originality/value

This is the first paper that offers a discussion of Hirschman’s ideas on contemporary projects, how to understand them, their behavior, including the principle of the Hiding Hand and other important nuggets of wisdom in his research such as the significance of project traits, latitudes, and disciplines. The authors discuss in what respects these ideas may enlighten PM practice and theory. This paper also conveys the novel idea that Hirschman is an early rethinker of PM.

Details

International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, vol. 9 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1753-8378

Keywords

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