Nearly a centennial after the granted women’s suffrage in the United States, almost 40 yearsfrom the start of the 70’s women’s right’s movements women have shown that they canobtain same level in education as men can and graduate with competitive skills as men.However, according to statistics that is when the equality seems to loose its balance. Despitethis there are women in this “Yes We Can”-era of where a former First Lady was verycompetitive in a Presidential Race, that with certain success factors compete effectively invarious male-dominant fields.

Purpose – During the past decades, implementing reforms becomes a popular topic for most manufacturers. With the aim to cope with the environment changes, there are urgent needs for these manufacturing companies to carry on reforms on the existing businesses. At the same time, value creation under a new service dominant logic for manufacturers are cited by many scholars. The aim of this paper is to analyze the new dominant logic, with the comparison of traditional goods dominant logic, recognize the advanced value creation model. To go a step further, this paper also discusses about the way of implementing reforms and new business logic for manufacturers. Methodology – This paper mainly takes the methodology of literature review. The literatures reviewed here include academic papers, books, and website information. The main field of literatures include: service definition and service characteristics; goods-dominant logic versus service dominant logic; and value creation (co-creation). On the other hand, some small case studies can also be found in this paper. Findings – After the comparing between goods dominant logic and service dominant logic, this paper suggests the service-dominant logic as a preferred business logic. Because it provides a more interactive way of consumption, presents a value-in-use view rather than value-in-exchange, and requires manufacturers playing a role of assisting customers in value creating process. For those manufacturers wish to implement the service dominant logic, this paper suggests them to take innovations on their business, which including the innovations on products/services, business processes, and business models. Research limitations/implications – As a relative new field of study, the research is mostly taken by literature review. However, the research on the implementing of new business logic and reforms requires more voice from the real industry.   Practical implications – Manufacturers may position themselves to new roles by involving in the customers’ value creating process. Taking innovations from a integrated view may help manufacturers to achieve the higher value under service dominant logic. Originality/value – This paper concluded the ongoing service dominant logic development, after which, offers a discussion on the implementing of which for the manufacturing companies.

<p>Nearly a centennial after the granted women’s suffrage in the United States, almost 40 yearsfrom the start of the 70’s women’s right’s movements women have shown that they canobtain same level in education as men can and graduate with competitive skills as men.However, according to statistics that is when the equality seems to loose its balance. Despitethis there are women in this “Yes We Can”-era of where a former First Lady was verycompetitive in a Presidential Race, that with certain success factors compete effectively invarious male-dominant fields.</p>

The feminist qualitative research undergirding this thesis focuses on the Nova Scotia high risk case coordination program, a protocol used to flag and coordinate woman abuse cases where there is a risk of serious injury or lethality. The research involved interviews with twenty-nine abused women in the high risk protocol, as well as focus groups with service providers implementing the protocol, including police, victim services, transition houses, men’s intervention programs, corrections and child welfare.The data collected through this research illuminated three broad themes regarding societal responses to woman abuse: the need to rethink the approach to the abuser, the need to rethink the approach to the victim, and the need to avoid one-size-fits-all solutions.The research also highlighted tensions and contradictions within the dominant domestic violence discourse. This thesis attempts to move beyond the dichotomous “either/or” thinking reflected in many of the current policies and programs relating to woman abuse.

Prostate cancer is the second leading cause of death from cancer in Australian men. As prostate cancer cells are reliant on androgens for growth and survival, the standard therapy for metastatic disease is androgen ablation therapy (AAT). AAT inhibits androgen signalling by altering androgen synthesis or prevent binding of androgens to their intracellular mediator, the androgen receptor (AR). Although initially effective, virtually all patients relapse, beyond which there are limited treatment options. The failure of AAT is not necessarily due to a decreased requirement for androgen signalling, but rather the AR is able to maintain signalling and tumour growth in an androgen-depleted environment. Therefore novel strategies that directly target the AR may provide a more effective therapeutic approach. We have endeavoured to suppress AR activity in prostate cancer cells by utilising a dominant negative AR. The most effective dominant negative construct developed, ARi41O, lacks amino acids 39-410 in the AR amino terminal transactivation domain. In studies of transcriptional activity, ARi410 has no intrinsic activity but inhibits the activity of wild type AR (wtAR) and also clinically relevant AR variants, by up to 95%. The objective of this thesis was to characterise the mechanisms of action of ARi410 and assess the functional effects of introducing this dominant negative receptor into prostate cancer cells. To investigate the mechanism by which ARi410 suppresses AR activity, a robust and sensitive AR inhibition assay was developed. This assay revealed that ARi410 is a potent inhibitor of AR activity on three independent AR-regulated promoters, regardless of the level of AR expression. Furthermore, while ARi410 can inhibit AR activity, it does not alter AR protein levels. By using ARi410 variants with mutations and/or deletions in regions of functional importance, the AR inhibition assay was also used to identify the critical regions of ARi410 required for its dominant negative activity. These studies demonstrate that the dominant negative activity of ARi41 0 is ligand-dependent, requires dimerisation through the ligand binding domain (LBD) and an intact DNA-binding domain (DBD). Further investigation into the mechanism of dominant negative activity revealed that ARi410 does not alter the subcellular localisation of AR, as both receptors are predominantly cytoplasmic in the absence of ligand and rapidly co-localise to the nucleus in response to androgens. Furthermore, an interaction between AR and ARi410 was observed in the presence and absence of ligand, and electrophoretic mobility shift assays demonstrated that AR and ARi410 form heterodimers on DNA. These studies led to the conclusion that the mechanism of dominant negative activity by ARi4I0 involves the formation of inactive receptor heterodimers that assemble on DNA and suppress AR activity. To determine the functional consequence of expressing the dominant negative androgen receptor in prostate cancer cells, an adenoviral method of gene delivery was developed. Adenoviral expression of ARi410 in LNCaP prostate cancer cells did not allow assessment of cell viability due to cell-specific toxicity of the viral vectors when expressed long-term. However, short-term expression of ARi410 in LNCaP cells resulted in inhibition of AR signalling, as determined by reduced expression of the androgen regulated genes apolipoprotein D and kallikrein 2. Importantly, this finding is consistent with the inhibitory activity of ARi410 observed using synthetic AR-regulated reporter genes in the AR inhibition assay, and demonstrates that ARi410 can effectively suppress endogenous AR signalling. The results of this thesis indicate that heterodimerisation between AR and ARi410 is the most likely mechanism of dominant negative inhibition of AR function by ARi410, and that the DBD and dimerisation through the LBD are required for optimal dominant negative activity. Furthermore, this thesis has demonstrated that ARi410 is an effective inhibitor of AR signalling and provides a basis for further functional studies and evaluation of the dominant negative androgen receptor in vitro and in vivo. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1338478 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Molecular and Biomedical Science, 2008

The personalization of telehealth services to accommodate patient preferences and interaction abilities could significantly improve patient adherence to telehealth treatment plans. Long-term adherence can be as low as 25% among chronic patients for reasons related to ease-of-use and personal preferences, which can be attributed to factors associated with the patient, physicians, and healthcare systems. Poor adherence in the long term can cause increased morbidity, poorer quality of life, a higher risk of mortality, and greater health care utilization. Poor adherence is partly driven by generic telehealth services that are not adapted to individual patients' lived experiences. Recent research calls for the personalization of telehealth services in a manner that addresses long-term adherence. This thesis views the telehealth service context from a multilevel service systems perspective. This perspective enables the articulation of the contextual differences between standardized and personalized services. This thesis proposes a service design method (SerViU: pronounced Serv You) to support a continuous Use - Assess - Personalize process; this design method focuses on the patient personal service encounter level within a telehealth service. SerViU is anchored in the service-dominant logic concept of value-in-use, and it assesses the patient's individualized experiences with the telehealth service and accordingly recommends a suitable personalization. SerViU guides decision-making about telehealth personalization by integrating an existing information communication technology (ICT) service personalization framework that identifies three types of ICT personalization: architectural, relational, and technological. A design science research methodology (DSRM) was used to guide the research activities underlying the development and validation of SerViU. Within this methodology, the SerViU Personalize Tool was selected to demonstrate SerViU's ability to personalize telehealth services by accounting for patient-related, service context-related, and technology-related factors. A multiple case study with embedded units of analysis was conducted at a Canadian hospital to simulate personalization decision-making using the SerViU Personalize Tool. The same participants were then asked to fill out a questionnaire to evaluate the tool's usefulness for decision-making, its relevance to the telehealth context, and whether it contained sufficient information to make personalization decisions. Results show that SerViU was relevant to telehealth contexts, useful for making personalization decisions, and provided sufficient information to make relevant decisions. The collected data were analyzed using cross- and within-case analysis by comparing decisions in different telemonitoring service modes. The comparisons included personalization options, feature selection, scores, rationales, and resource-related information. The results of this research provide a means to operationalize telehealth personalization as proposed in telehealth research. This study provides a method which can guide the transformation of generic telehealth services into personalized services. This research contributes to service design by differentiating between standard and personal service encounter levels, which is paramount for supporting the personalization of ICT-enabled services. This research contributes to the telehealth practice by presenting an ongoing telehealth personalization process that involves patients in decision-making throughout their treatment processes as a means to improving long-term adherence.

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Self-service technologies are rapidly increasing in the retailing industries as retailers aim to streamline transactions and enhance efficiency for both consumers and themselves. Despite various studies on SSTs, exploring their usability, impact, and influence on consumers' value co-creation was still lacking. Through this study, the influence of SSTs on consumers' value co-creation has been investigated by a qualitative approach, consisting of interviews and observational studies. The gathered data has helped this study to gain insights into the subjective dimensions of consumers' experiences, behaviors, and interactions with SSTs in a supermarket in East London.  Thematic analysis of the data reveals four key dimensions of value co-creation through SSTs: Value-Driven Efficiency, Autonomous Value Co-Creation, Value-Enriched Shopping Experience, and Value-Driven Refinement. Applying Service-Dominant (S-D) logic, the study finds that SSTs significantly enhance shopping experiences by providing convenience, efficiency, and autonomy, especially for small purchases. Consumers engage actively with SSTs, making informed decisions and navigating independently, with assistance available as needed. Common challenges include scanning items without barcodes, purchasing age-restricted items, and SSTs malfunctioning. Despite these issues, the overall impact of SSTs remains positive.

Although Business Intelligence (BI) is highly promoted and praised, organisations implementing a BI solution do not always achieve expected benefits. Instead, numerous reports of failed BI implementations and challenges prevail. Even organisations indicating they receive benefit from their BI solutions strive for improvement in BI. This highlights a need for BI to improve and for it to overcome its challenges. In response, this thesis proposes a paradigm shift for BI. It provides a literature and case study, representing an interpretive enquiry using a qualitative research approach. The case study is set within a large South African bank, extending to BI vendors providing BI solutions to the bank. Two scenarios are used to compare the views of BI providers and BI customers. In one scenario, the bank’s internal BI departments represent the BI provider view, providing BI to other departments within the bank as their BI customers. In the other scenario, the BI vendors represent the BI provider view and the BI customer view is represented by the bank’s BI departments as well as other internal bank departments – who are also the BI customers of the BI departments. The thesis starts by identifying BI’s prevailing challenges, highlighting the restrictive tendency evident within BI literature and practice whereby typical Information System (IS) challenges are raised as BI challenges. Challenges are then examined to understand their BI-specific aspects and to identify a list of BI’s prevailing challenges. The thesis then examines current measures proposed to address BI’s challenges, establishing that these are largely ineffective. Rather than attempt to resolve BI’s challenges in the same manner as previous attempts do, this thesis then analyses BI at a conceptual level to reveal a common worldview of BI held by BI practitioners and academics. It is identified that this common worldview is predominantly based on a Goods-Dominant (G-D) Logic, resulting in many of BI’s challenges. A suggestion is made to shift this worldview to a Service-Dominant (S-D) Logic. Although S-D Logic is not a new lens, it has not yet been explicitly applied to BI or a BI-related discipline at a conceptual level, offering the opportunity to examine BI from a new perspective wherein new insights to address BI’s persistent challenges emerge. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Informatics / unrestricted

The purpose of this study was to investigate the reaction time and speed of movement of the dominant and non-dominant arms of elementary-school boys and girls.