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The issue of mental health literacy has been widely studied in developed countries, with few studies conducted in Arab countries. In this study we aimed to investigate mental health literacy and attitudes towards psychiatric patients among students of Jazan University, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. A cross-sectional study was conducted among undergraduate students using a validated Arabic-version questionnaire. A total of 557 students were recruited from different Jazan university colleges. The majority of students (90.3%) have intermediate mental health literacy. Regarding the etiology of mental illness, students agreed that genetic inheritance (45.8%), poor quality of life (65%) and social relationship weakness (73.1%) are the main causes of mental illness. The majority thought that mentally ill people are not capable of true friendships (52.5%) and that anyone can suffer from a mental illness (49.4%). Students' attitudes towards psychiatric patients were mixed, with 68.7% reporting that they could maintain a friendship with a mentally ill person and that people with mental illness should have the same rights as anyone else (82.5%). Mental health literacy among university students was intermediate. There is an urgent need for health educational programs to change the attitudes of students regarding this important health issue.

Although social anxiety disorder (SAD) is a common mental disorder, it is often under diagnosed and under treated. The aim of this study is to assess the prevalence, severity, disability, and quality of life towards SAD among students of Jazan University, Saudi Arabia. A cross-sectional study was conducted among a stratified sample of 500 undergraduate students to identify the prevalence of SAD, its correlates, related disability, and its impact on the quality life. All participants completed the Social Phobia Inventory, Leibowitz Social Anxiety Scale, Sheehan Disability Scale, and the WHO Quality of Life – BREF questionnaire. Of 476 students, 25.8% were screened positive for SAD. About 47.2% of the students had mild symptoms, 42.3% had moderate to marked symptoms, and 10.5% had severe to very severe symptoms of SAD. Students who resulted positive for SAD reported significant disabilities in work, social, and family areas, and this has adversely affected their quality of life as compared to those who screened negative for SAD. Students reported several clinical manifestations that affected their functioning and social life. Acting, performing or giving a talk in front of an audience was the most commonly feared situation. Blushing in front of people was the most commonly avoided situation. Since the present study showed a marked prevalence of SAD among students, increased disability, and impaired quality of life, rigorous efforts are needed for early recognition and treatment of SAD.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the “event” of the construction of Naguib Mahfouz Square. Drawing on the memory of Gamaet-Aldowel-AlArabyia Street, it attempts to uncover the socio-cultural structures inherited in the Egyptian urban street.

This study adopts Foucauldian discourse on institutions of “knowledge and authority” to approach the power relations between the actors involved. This discourse was constructed through in-depth, unstructured interviews with architects and involved government personnel as well as other archival resources that included national newspapers and magazines.

This discourse reflected an institutional controversy between these actors over the perception and design of the Egyptian street, highlighting the alienation of the designer, and the user/lay-people, from the urban institution. Naguib Mahfouz Square presented a considerable deviation from the established norms of street design in Egypt at that time through its commemoration of a contemporary figure in literature, the architect’s involvement in the design process and the unfencing of urban space. This event thus questions the perception of the urban street beyond our socio-cultural inheritance, and towards street design as a performative urban act that embraces the everyday activities of lay-people in the street.

The paper utilises Foucauldian discourse on power to approach a case study of an urban event and space in Egypt, which has not previously been investigated thoroughly. It thus holds potential towards the resolution of inherited conflict between the urban street and the urban institution.

The efficiency of fractional derivative and hereditary combined approach in modeling viscoelastic behavior of soft foams was successfully addressed in Elfarhani et al. (2016a). Since predictions obtained on flexible polyurethane foam (FPF) type A (density 28 kg m⁻³) were found very promoting, the purpose of this paper is to apply the approach basing on two other types of foams. Both soft polyurethane foams type B of density 42 kg m⁻³ and type C of density 50 kg m⁻³ were subjected to multi-cycles compressive tests.

The total foam response is assumed to be the sum of a non-linear elastic component and viscoelastic component. The elastic force is modeled by a seven-order polynomial function of displacement. The hereditary approach was applied during the loading half-cycles to simulate the short memory effects while the fractional derivative approach was applied during unloading cycles to simulate the long memory effects. An identification methodology based on the separation of the measurements of each component force was developed to avoid parameter admixture problems.

The proposed model reveals good reliability in predicting the responses of the two considered flexible foams. Predictions as measurements establish that residual responses were negligible compared to elastic and viscoelastic damping responses.

The development of a new combined model reveals good reliability in predicting the responses of the two polyurethane foams type A and B.

The purpose of this study is to assess the prevalence of burnout syndrome and its associated factors among medical students at Jazan University, Jazan, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 440 randomly selected medical students at Jazan University. The questionnaire used for this study was based on the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory.

The overall prevalence of burnout was estimated at 60.2% (95% CI 55.6–64.8). The prevalence was higher for females (64.1%) than for males (56.2%) but without statistically significant differences (p > 0.05). On average, the students scored the highest averages in the personal burnout category, followed by the study-related and client-related burnout categories. In the multivariate analysis, a lower age (beta = −3.17, p = 0.026), female (beta = −0.896, p = 0.016), and having better burnout knowledge (beta = 0.710, p = 0.025) predict significantly higher personal burnout.

It is necessary to implement strategies to reduce the incidence of burnout among medical students for the sake of a better quality of life for future doctors.

There is a high prevalence of burnout among Jazan’s medical students.

Najib Mahfuz is the first Arab‐language author to win the Nobel Prize in literature. Born in 1911 the son of a middle‐class Jamaliyah merchant, he became the most popular novelist in Egypt and the Arab countries.

The purpose of this paper is to draw a map of the general features of epistemological and critical concerns in contemporary Islamic philosophy. This study will not be confined to the domain of academic philosophy or to those who are professionals in the field of philosophy.

The paper adopted the critical rational approach in dealing with contemporary Islamic philosophy in the Arab world. The scope will include scholars from different fields of epistemology who tried to present a “vision” of the attitude that should be adopted in facing the challenges of the age and the problems of the nation on the epistemological level or the political, economic and social levels.

There is a need for a philosophy of action and progress rather than a philosophy that is based on abstract ideas and theories and of words/rhetoric. The ethics required to accomplish this ought to identify the attributes of the citizen who can reach self-actualization through legitimate means based on a progress agenda with theoretical and philosophical foundations.

Because a critical rational approach can be dealt with from different perspectives, this paper will adopt the classification of the principal intellectual trends: the reformist, secular and liberal.

This paper covers a long time span to determine whether the philosophical projects have been effective.

This paper, which criticizes the philosophic projects that are theoretically unsound and that do not address real social problems (like poverty), argues the need for a philosophy of progress and action. This will lead to devising an agenda that addresses the challenges the society is facing and to finding alternative and creative solutions resulting in development.

This paper aims to apply a methodology that is capable to classify and localize mechanical, electrical and plumbing (MEP) elements to assist facility managers. Furthermore, it assists in decreasing the technical complexity and sophistication of different systems to the facility management (FM) team.

This research exploits artificial intelligence (AI) in FM operations through proposing a new system that uses a deep learning pre-trained model for transfer learning. The model can identify new MEP elements through image classification with a deep convolutional neural network using a support vector machine (SVM) technique under supervised learning. Also, an expert system is developed and integrated with an Android application to the proposed system to identify the required maintenance for the identified elements. FM team can reach the identified assets with bluetooth tracker devices to perform the required maintenance.

The proposed system aids facility managers in their tasks and decreases the maintenance costs of facilities by maintaining, upgrading, operating assets cost-effectively using the proposed system.

The paper considers three fire protection systems for proactive maintenance, where other structural or architectural systems can also significantly affect the level of service and cost expensive repairs and maintenance. Also, the proposed system relies on different platforms that required to be consolidated for facility technicians and managers end-users. Therefore, the authors will consider these limitations and expand the study as a case study in future work.

This paper assists in a proactive manner to decrease the lack of knowledge of the required maintenance to MEP elements that leads to a lower life cycle cost. These MEP elements have a big share in the operation and maintenance costs of building facilities.

This aim of this paper is to relate the spread of new information and communications technology in Arab countries to the mobilization of young Tunisians and Egyptians in the uprisings of 2011.

The paper draws on the literature to discuss the opportunities the new social media tools brought to Arab societies, in terms of their potential to enable new forms of communication and develop new public spheres. It provides an overview of the relationship between the new media, a new generation and the uprising for democracy and political changes in North Africa.

The conclusion is that the spread and use of new information and communications technologies is having an enormous impact on societal and political changes in North Africa.

Based on the uprisings in parts of North Africa, the paper examines the use of the internet and mobile phones as tools for building democracy and bringing change. Evidence shows that social media played a major role in bringing down long‐standing dictatorships. The new media challenged government imposed media controls and provided activists with new tools for organising demonstrations, sending updates to journalists, bloggers and other activists, and encouraging media coverage.

Wasta is an Arabic word that means the intervention of a patron in favor of a client in attempt to obtain privileges or resources from a third party. In Arab countries, wasta is often used to obtain employment, thus causing unequal opportunity. The purpose of this paper is to study the attributions that people make regarding the competency and morality of wasta users. The main hypothesis is that those that use wasta in obtaining employment will be perceived as less competent and moral than those that do not.

The study is designed as a factorial quasi‐experiment, with three independent variables; wasta, employee qualification and socioeconomic status. The dependent variables are perceived competency and morality. Data were gathered from 421 Egyptian undergraduate business students attending a public and a private university.

In support of the hypotheses, subjects discounted the competency and morality of employees that used wasta to obtain the job. Additionally, subjects from lower socioeconomic groups evaluated wasta users more positively than more affluent subjects.

This is the first study that attempts to use attribution theory to examine the effects of wasta on perceptions of competency and morality. The study may be useful in identifying the disadvantages of using wasta, thus reducing its use.