Theory Therapeutic communities (TC) for substance abuse depend on the mutual aid among a group of residents to positively support the recovery process. An example of this aid arises from the expectation that TC residents will provide affirmations to each other for actions that are considered positive toward recovery or beneficial to the resident community. TCs are effective at treating substanc...

Smart grid has integrated an increasing number of distributed energy resources to improve efficiency and flexibility of power generation and consumption as well as the resilience of the power grid. The energy consumers on the power grid (e.g., households) equipped with distributed energy resources can be considered as “microgrids” that both generate and consume electricity. To facilitate energy...

Electronic distributed learning that overlooks the physical and geographic status of learners has become a reality. Moreover, its quality has been considerably improved by utilizing recent advances in webbased technology. Various electronic learning support systems such as Internet-based tutorials and Virtual Universities have appeared in different forms and reflect advances in technology. Howe...

In Nigeria, the government is implementing the Free Maternal and Child Health Care Programme (FMCHCP). The policy is premised on the notion that financial barriers are one of the most important constraints to equitable access and use of skilled maternal and child healthcare. In Ebonyi State, Southeastern Nigeria the FMCHCP is experiencing implementation challenges including: inadequate human re...

sional researcher on banking, financial markets, economic forecasting, the housing market, consumer finance, the regional economy, and more. More abstracts may be found at www.philadelphiafed.org/ research-and-data/publications/research-rap/. You can find their full working papers at http://www.philadelphiafed.org/research-and-data/publications/working-papers/. Abstracts of research papers prod...

Professor Ebrahim (Abe) Mamdani died on January 22, 2010. He was born in Tanzania in June 1942 and educated in India, he went to UK in 1966. After obtaining his PhD at Queen Mary College, University of London, he joined its Electrical Engineering Department, where he developed the first fuzzy controller. In the mid-eighties he moved to Imperial College, where he was now an Emeritus Professor. I...

Participation in virtual communities of practice (vCoP) can be influenced at the same time by technology acceptance and by community factors. To overcome methodological issues connected with the analysis of these influences, learning analytics were applied. Based on a recent vCoP model, the collaborative dialogue comprising 4040 interventions in 1981 messages created by a vCoP located at a US A...

Elderly people in Japan are becoming part of virtual communities. This article explores the online experience of such people, how they interact with others and how they construct social support relationships via computermediated communication (CMC). This ethnographic research, through participant observation and in-depth interviews, reveals that these elderly people enjoy interaction in a varie...

Despite significant advancements in Web-based simulation research, its commercial applicability and adoption by users has not widened to the desired extent. We believe that by providing tools to support interaction, collaboration and formation of social networks, we may stimulate more interest in, and the wider adoption of Web-based simulation. This paper presents our work in developing an onli...

This article reports on the design, development, testing and presentation of preliminary evidence of a translational, culturally relevant parenting education model, titled Smart and Secured Children (SSC). SSC, a quality parenting curriculum, prepares disparate African American parents as leaders for transforming their parenting behaviors and leading their peers and community in changing existi...