Promoting independent living and recreation in life through ambient assisted living technology

The increase in life expectancy with a decrease in birth rates is contributing to the ageing of the European population. This phenomenon, coupled with greater awareness of the quality of life, the need to have cost-efficient assistive care, the intention of people to live independently in their homes, and the technological developments in recent decades, have contributed to the emergence of the concept of ambient assisted living (AAL). AAL solutions aim to provide healthy and safe ageing to users through promoting independence in performing daily activities and interacting with technology, taking into consideration the deterioration of the users’ capabilities and the reduced costs of the solutions. In this chapter, AAL developments of monitoring activities of daily living (ADLs) and participation in a virtual community with the selected stakeholders are introduced, their roadmap with the expected technological developments are described, and the expected impact of these solutions on the end users of the developed solutions are discussed. This enables a real user guidance structure that represents the different needs and limitations of each user, presenting a highly structured project based on personas and possible solutions for them. The AAL4ALL Ambient Assisted Living for All (ALL4ALL) project is considered here as a case study to analyze and illustrate the ALL concepts discussed in this chapter.

Training and development in Irish technology companies

The sustained economic growth that has been experienced in the Irish economy in recent years has relied, to a large extent, on the contribution and performance of those industry sectors that possess the ability to provide high-value-added products and services to domestic and international markets. One such contributor has been the Technology sector. However, the performance of this sector relies upon the availability of the necessary capabilities and competencies for Technology companies to remain competitive. The Expert Group on Future Skills Needs have forecasted future skills shortages in this sector. The purpose of this research has been to examine the extent to which Irish Technology companies are taking measures to meet changing skills requirements, through training and development interventions. Survey research methods (in the form of a mail questionnaire, supported by a Web-based questionnaire) have been used to collect information on the expenditure on, and approach to, training and development in these companies, in addition to the methods, techniques and tools/aids that are used to support the delivery of these activities. The contribution of Government intervention has also been examined. The conclusions have been varied. When the activities of the responding companies are considered in isolation, the picture to emerge is primarily positive. Although the expenditure on training and development is slightly lower than that indicated in previous studies, the results vary by company size. Technical employees are clearly the key focus of training provision, while Senior Managers and Directors, Clerical and Administrative staff and Manual workers are a great deal more neglected in training provision. Expenditure on, and use of, computer-based training methods is high, as is the use of most of the specified techniques for facilitating learning. However, when one considers the extent to which external support (in the form of Government interventions and cooperation with other companies and with education and training providers) is integrated into the overall training practices of these companies, significant gaps in practice are identified. The thesis concludes by providing a framework to guide future training and development practices in the Technology sector.

Health and social inequalities in English adolescents: Exploring the importance of school, family and neighbourhood

The Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) study was established 22 years ago. It is cross-national research conducted by an international network of teams in collaboration with the World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Europe. Its aim is to gain new insight into young people۪s health, wellbeing and health behaviour, including links with their social context. Researchers from three countries started the HBSC study in 1982 and since then, a growing number of countries and regions have joined the study. This report presents findings from the 2001/2 English part of the study, which was carried out on behalf of the Health Development Agency by BMRB Social Research. This is the third time the survey has been carried out in England; previous surveys took place in 1995 and 1997.

Investing Effectively in Information and Communication Technology in Schools, 2008-2013

Learning is changing. A pivotal force in bringing about this change is the use of information and communications technology (ICT) which provides richer, more immediate, world-relevant educational resources and opportunities. When used well, ICT enriches learning and enhances teaching. It invigorates classroom activities and is a powerful motivational tool that encourages learners to progress in more personalised and self-directed ways. Ireland has achieved rapid change and growth in the past decade, but to sustain this we must prepare the next generation for the knowledge society in which they will live. The challenge we face is to ensure that the emphasis on ICT in schools shifts, in the immediate future, from technology provision to a focus on its deliberate use by the learner. Fostering personal creativity has always been a desirable educational value. The pursuit of creativity and inventiveness are now pivotal skills in a knowledge economy and the embedding of ICT in learning can greatly facilitate their development. Web 2.0 will facilitate greater interactivity and enable greater levels of user-generated content. It is crucial that young people acquire the ICT and related skills to support these new opportunities.

Struggles for meaning and struggles for control: the diffusion of bandwagon technology in two institutional environments

In this thesis, I examine the diffusion process for a complex medical technology, the PET scanner, in two different health care systems, one of which is more market-oriented (Switzerland) and the other more centrally managed by a public agency (Quebec). The research draws on institutional and socio-political theories of the diffusion of innovations to examine how institutional contexts affect processes of diffusion. I find that diffusion proceeds more rapidly in Switzerland than in Quebec, but that processes in both jurisdictions are characterized by intense struggles among providers and between providers and public agencies. I show that the institutional environment influences these processes by determining the patterns of material resources and authority available to actors in their struggles to strategically control the technology, and by constituting the discursive resources or institutional logics on which actors may legitimately draw in their struggles to give meaning to the technology in line with their interests and values. This thesis illustrates how institutional structures and meanings manifest themselves in the context of specific decisions within an organizational field, and reveals the ways in which governance structures may be contested and realigned when they conflict with interests that are legitimized by dominant institutional logics. It is argued that this form of contestation and readjustment at the margins constitutes one mechanism by which institutional frameworks are tested, stretched and reproduced or redefined.

Openness and technology diffusion in payment

We study the relationship between openness and payment system development. In particular, we analyze how the existence of technology diffusion from a more developed country fosters a transformation of payment choice in a less developed country. We apply our analysis to Mexico. Economic growth in Mexico was not high enough to cause a transformation of payment choice observed in the data after 2001. We argue that the switch towards electronic payments can be attributed to openness and related payment technology spillovers from the US in the context of NAFTA.

Impact of Federal Library Services and Technology Act Funds in Iowa, May 2007.

A report that Mary Wegner gave Iowa's congressmen and senators during this year's ALA Legislative Day in Washington, DC. The report reflects the important ways the State Library uses LSTA funds to help Iowa libraries provide the best service possible to their customers. LSTA funds also pay the salaries of Library Development staff.

Interference of Native Language in English Language Acquisition in Santa Cruz and Calheta Secondary schools

This study analyzes the interference of native language when students are learning a foreign language, in this case English. According to this study, interferences from the native language such as lexical-semantic and phonological are not infrequent. It is one of the main barriers that create difficulties when learning English. The outcome of this study is presented at the end of the Monografia: to provide English-language teachers and students the most significant linguistic interferences that occur during the learning process of English language. Furthermore, some teaching strategies are discussed to avoid the biases that appear due to the interferences of the native language. As a result of this study, I hope to contribute to the learning success among English-language students.

Complementarity between technology make and buy in innovation strategies: Evidence from Belgiam manufacturing firms

This paper characterizes the innovation strategy of manufacturing firms andexamines the relation between the innovation strategy and importantindustry-, firm- and innovation-specific characteristics using Belgiandata from the Eurostat Community Innovation Survey. In addition to importantsize effects explaining innovation, we find that high perceived risks andcosts and low appropriability of innovations do not discourage innovation,but rather determine how the innovation sourcing strategy is chosen. Withrespect to the determinants of the decision of the innovative firm toproduce technology itself (Make) or to source technology externally (Buy),we find that small firms are more likely restrict their innovation strategyto an exclusive make or buy strategy, while large firms are more likely tocombine both internal and external knowledge acquisition in their innovationstrategy. An interesting result that highlights the complementary nature ofthe Make and Buy decisions, is that, controlled for firm size, companies forwhich internal information is an important source for innovation are morelikely to combine internal and external sources of technology. We find thisto be evidence of the fact that in-house R&D generates the necessaryabsorptive capacity to profit from external knowledge acquisition. Also theeffectiveness of different mechanisms to appropriate the benefits ofinnovations and the internal organizational resistance against change areimportant determinants of the firm's technology sourcing strategy.

Trends in hours, balanced growth and the role of technology in the business cycle

The present paper revisits a property embedded in most dynamic macroeconomic models: the stationarity of hours worked. First, I argue that, contrary to what is often believed, there are many reasons why hours could be nonstationary in those models, while preserving the property of balanced growth. Second, I show that the postwar evidence for most industrialized economies is clearly at odds with the assumption of stationary hours per capita. Third, I examine the implications of that evidence for the role of technology as a source of economic fluctuations in the G7 countries.