In the development of systems that have to be dependable, weaknesses in the requirements engineering (RE) process are highly undesirable. Such weaknesses may either introduce undetected system weaknesses, or otherwise significant costs may arise in their correction later in the development process. Typically, the RE process contains a number of individual and group activities and thus is partic...

Research on biological invasions has increased rapidly over the past 30 years, generating numerous explanations of how species become invasive. While the mechanisms of invasive species establishment are well studied, the mechanisms driving abundance patterns (i.e. patterns of population density) remain poorly understood. Invasive species typically have higher abundances in their new environment...

OBJECTIVE To analyze gender differences in the incidence and determinants of disability regarding instrumental activities of daily living among older adults. METHODS The data were extracted from the Saúde, Bem-Estar e Envelhecimento (SABE - Health, Wellbeing and Ageing) study. In 2000, 1,034 older adults without difficulty in regarding instrumental activities of daily living were selected. The ...

community participation, as one of the basic components of sustainable development in a community. this study aimed to determine patterns of community participation, identify factors associated with their social and civic engagement, and examine the relation between the factors and community engagement patterns. patterns of citizen participation were determined in social and civic engagements. ...

The dynamics of human mobility characterizes the trajectories that humans follow during their daily activities and is the foundation of processes from epidemic spreading to traffic prediction and information recommendation. In this paper, we investigate a massive data set of human activity, including both online behavior of browsing websites and offline one of visiting towers based mobile termi...

BACKGROUND The proportion of people in Vietnam who are 60 years and over has increased rapidly. The emigration of young people and impact of other socioeconomic changes leave more elderly on their own and with less family support. This study assesses the willingness to use and pay for different models of care for community-dwelling elderly in rural Vietnam. METHODS In 2007, people aged 60 and...

Urban leisure venues proffer spatial carriers for citizens’ leisure activities and their functions rely heavily on the spatial configuration, which have largely been ignored. The increasing needs for healthy leisure life and the availability of geospatial open data provide a rising opportunity to fill this gap. To examine the spatial distribution of leisure venues and explore its underlying dom...

I HAD BETTER BEGIN BY CONFESSING that I am not an enthusiast for rational choice theory (hereafter RCT). It is not uncommon for devotees of RCT to suggest that it provides a quite general tool for understanding human behaviour, and should largely supersede traditional historical, cultural, and related theoretical approaches. While I am happy to acknowledge that RCT may provide a useful set of t...

BACKGROUND Although substantial effort has been devoted to reducing readmissions among heart failure (HF) patients, little is known about factors identified by patients and caregivers that may contribute to readmissions. The goal of this study was to compare the perspectives of HF patients, their caregivers, and their care team on HF management and hospital admissions. Understanding these persp...

OBJECTIVE To analyze if demographic and socioeconomic factors and factors related to health and health services are associated with frailty in community-dwelling older adults. METHODS This is a cross-sectional study with 339 older adults (60 years old or more) living in Juiz de Fora, State of Minas Gerais, Brazil, in 2015. A household survey was carried out and frailty was evaluated using the...