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The purpose of this paper is to propose a permanent magnet-assisted synchronous reluctance machine (PMASynRM) using ferrite magnets with the same power density as rare-earth PM synchronous motors used in Toyota Prius 2010.

A novel rotor structure with rectangular PMs is discussed with respect to the demagnetization of ferrite magnets and mechanical strength. Some electromagnetic characteristics including torque, output power, loss and efficiency are calculated by 2D finite element analysis.

The results of the analysis show that a high power density and high efficiency for PMASynRM can be achieved using ferrite magnets.

This paper proposes a novel rotor structure of PMASynRM with low-cost ferrite magnets that achieves high power density as permanent machines with rare-earth PMs.

Using archival and primary source evidence, this chapter introduces the first real wage series from 1891 to 1930 for Brazil’s most important immigrant and industrial city, São Paulo. This is the first price series, nominal wage series, and real wage series for the city that covers the duration of the Old Republic. While scholars look to Rio de Janeiro evidence to compare Brazil’s cost of living to other southern cone and immigrant-receiving countries, it is preferable to use evidence from the primary destination city. Price deviations between the two cities underscore the need for these series. The results show foodstuff prices increased steadily over the period and more dramatically in the period during and after World War I. Hedonic wage regressions show hourly wages for unskilled, low-skilled, and medium-skilled workers did not increase accordingly. While the decline in real wages tapered off in the 1920s, real wages across skill levels did not recover to prewar levels. This new index suggests the city of São Paulo’s labor market was more integrated with Buenos Aires’s than with Rio de Janeiro’s and that Paulistano real wages did not recover in the 1920s to the extent that they did in other southern cone cities. Given these results, the puzzle as to why migrants continued to flock to the city prove more intriguing. The results also suggest that Vargas-era labor legislation had the potential to greatly improve the lives of the city’s working class, perhaps more so than in other cities.

Information may well be an asset, but the sheer volume of what we have to navigate makes it challenging to determine those elements which are relevant to us. The credibility of news media outlets as our gatekeepers and first form of resistance to polluted information is increasingly questioned. Scientific research indicates that the quality of news offerings from news media outlets would benefit by triangulating news stories with a more diverse set of offerings and, in the process, build journalists' trust or otherwise in the sources of these offerings. Without the network effects of the Internet, false or incorrect information probably would not be such a successful phenomenon. Public opinion is quick to portray social or mainstream media platforms as guilty parties but tends to ignore the equally detrimental ramifications of their exploitation of social capital. A more reflective approach is required. This essay suggests that it is in our interest to reboot our societal consciousness and explore the underlying cybernetical dimensions, even if these appear to be confrontational for interested stakeholders in our current misinformation crisis.

This study uses a mixed methods approach to investigate the pedagogical approaches and teaching practices that the English Department at a private Lebanese university implemented to rectify the deteriorating speaking skills of their students during the first few months of the lockdown in Lebanon between March and June 2020. The data consisted of semi-structured interviews with English instructors, the speaking assessment scores, and the English peer support program (PSP) enrollment records. Qualitative analysis of the interviews identified the main challenges that the English instructors faced during their transition from face-to-face (FTF) to distance education. The analysis also identified the intervention strategies that were implemented to overcome these barriers to learning and adapt to and even benefit from computer-mediated communication (CMC) instruction and other technological resources to develop and improve the oral proficiency and fluency of tertiary English as a Foreign Language (EFL) students. The quantitative analysis referred to the average percentage variation of the pre-test and post-test scores of the speaking assessment to track the improvement (or lack thereof) of the students’ speaking skills across four semesters, prior to and after the intervention. A one-way ANOVA test was also conducted for the enrollment records of the English PSP and speaking assessment scores that showed that the program was an effective form of intervention that helped struggling students to at least prevent the further deterioration of their speaking capabilities in English. These findings show that for students to develop and enhance their speaking skills in English in a distance education context and during emergency times, efforts need to be made to reduce the hindering psychological factors and address all technology-related barriers that disrupt the online language learning environment and process.

Inclusion Europe, the European movement of people with intellectual disabilities and their families, shared what people with intellectual disabilities and their families faced during the COVID-19 crisis. Collecting information showed people with intellectual disabilities were segregated and discriminated against. The pandemic intensified and magnified the segregation and discrimination of people with intellectual disabilities, shedding light on their exclusion. Many human rights were violated. Therefore, such testimonies should encourage governments and institutions to urgently design a society that includes people with intellectual disabilities and their families.

Purpose: This chapter focuses on the relations between aging and the perception about the families’ quality of life in a medium-sized Portuguese city. Departing from the descriptions of individuals living with at least one child under 14 years of age, particular emphasis is put on how young adults perceive and incorporate into their speeches the presence and role of non-cohabiting elderly, namely their parents and in-laws, as an expression of the quality of life they experience.

Design/methodology/approach: Data rely on episodic interviews conducted with both men and women with young children (3–14 years old), within a broader sociological research devoted to the study of family rituals. The data collected was analyzed using qualitative techniques of content analysis with the help of NVivo software (QSR). The data is presented recurring to contextualized narratives.

Findings: Data analysis allows to conclude that geography matters in the perception that young adults have when reflecting upon the role of the elderly surrounding them, either their parents or in-laws. The presence and coexistence of generations are perceived as “priceless,” a “fortune,” and a “privilege,” possible in a medium-sized city, where everything is close enough to thicken the informal intergenerational solidarities between grandparents, parents, and grandchildren. Behind the scenes, data, furthermore, discloses unpredictable tensions arising mainly regarding children’s education, rules, and behavior.

Originality/value: This chapter contributes to shed light into the daily life of elderly people who are still independent and active, and the seemingly invisible presence and unimportant role they play in their children and grandchildren’s lives.

The study aims to estimate the prevalence of workplace bullying, personal and work-related impacts, reporting practices for bullying, and the reasons for not reporting bullying incidents in the New Zealand pharmacy sector.

An online survey was conducted among registered pharmacists and pharmacist interns in New Zealand from June to August 2020. The questionnaire comprises both close-ended and semi-structured free-text questions. Goldberg’s 12-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) assessed the respondents’ general psychological health status, and a 22-item Negative Acts Questionnaire-Revised (NAQ-R) was used to estimate bullying prevalence together with the self-rated/self-labeled questions. The qualitative information obtained from the free-text responses was used to support and elaborate on the quantitative results.

The self-labeled prevalence of workplace bullying was 36.9%, with almost 10% reporting it occurring almost daily to several times per week. The 54.7% prevalence based on the NAQ-R assessment compares well with the prevalence of witnessing the incidents (58.5%). Psychological distress symptoms were experienced by 37.1% in pre-COVID and 45.3% during COVID-year 1. Supervisors or direct managers were the commonest perpetrators (32.7%). Only 28.8% of those who experienced bullying had reported the incidents formally.

This study is cross-sectional, and the relationships indicated are bi-directional. The consistency of the results is reassuring, however inferring causality of effect is challenging. Future studies and analyses should focus on this. This study suggests that in the pharmacy environment bullying from the top is reasonably prevalent, is not commonly reported and requires the design and implementation of prevention and management strategies that take into account and mitigate these bullying factors. Professional pharmacy leadership organizations, National Health Authority and Pharmacy regulators could play a significant role in awareness and training to reduce bullying with the development and promotion of strategies to curb it and improve reporting.

This is the first paper to describe the prevalence and impact of workplace bullying, and the practices of reporting bullying incidents in the New Zealand pharmacy sector. Based on empirical evidence, pharmacists represent a small share of total healthcare workforce, yet the overall prevalence of bullying is consistent with professions with much larger numbers such as medicine and nursing.

Using projects executed with both traditional and integrated procurement methods, the study sought to investigate relationships that exist among project participants and the influence of those relationships on cost growth. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Questionnaires were administered among 274 construction projects located in 12 states including the Federal Capital Territory of Nigeria. Responses were obtained from 96 projects. Data were subjected to both descriptive and inferential analyses.

In terms of cordiality, relationships between client and contractors ranked highest, while those among in-house project teams ranked lowest. Cost growth or cost overrun is significantly correlated with client-contractor relationship, consultant-contractor relationship, client-consultant-contractor relationship and in-house team relationships. No association between procurement method and cost growth was found.

The limitation of generalizability of results due to the sampling method used is acknowledged. One implication of the findings is that in the context of this research, any explanation for cost growth has to be found outside procurement methods.

Findings may assist project participants on variables to consider in anticipating, preventing or managing cost growth in building construction projects, beyond formularization of contracts and structures.

The research has uniquely investigated the association between intangible project team relationships and tangible variable of cost growth.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the deformation characteristics and failure modes of the right bank slope of Xiluodu Hydropower Station after excavation.

Micro-seismic monitoring technology is applied to obtain the microfracture information and study the internal damage evolution law of the slope rock mass. A numerical model for discontinuous deformation analysis (DDA) is established to analyse the deformation characteristics and failure mode of the slope. Micro-seismic monitoring and DDA can verify and supplement each other's results in the investigation of slope failure.

The results show that the slope has a downhill displacement along the weathered zone under natural conditions; the maximum resultant displacement at the monitoring point is 380 mm. The micro-seismic events are concentrated in an area located 30–100 m horizontally away from the slope surface and at an elevation of 390–470 m. The distribution of these micro-seismic events is consistent with the location of the unloading and weathered zones; it is the same as the DDA simulation result.

The study is anticipated to be used as reference for the stability analysis of rock slopes. By combining the continuous (micro-seismic monitoring technology) and discontinuous (DDA) methods, the entire process starting from the gradual accumulation of internal rock micro-damage to the macroscopic discontinuous deformation and failure of the slope can be investigated.

The annual cost of alcohol‐related harm in the UK is estimated to be between £17.7 and £25.1 billion with healthcare costs alone reaching £2.7 billion and the costs of alcohol‐fuelled crime and disorder accounting for £7.3 billion each year. The aim of the study was to examine the prevalence of alcohol use disorders (AUD) in prison and probation settings in the North East of England, and to compare the ability of the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) and Offender Assessment System (OASys) at identifying alcohol‐related need in probation clients. A quantitative prevalence study was carried out using anonymous questionnaires with participants from four prisons and three probation offices in the North East who voluntarily completed the AUDIT questionnaire during a 1‐month period in 2006. Response outcomes on AUDIT were compared with OASys scores which identify alcohol‐related need in probation. At the time of the study OASys scores were not available for offenders in prison. Seven hundred and fifteen questionnaires were completed. Sixty‐three per cent of men and 57% of women were identified as having an AUD with over a third of all individuals scoring within the possibly dependant range (20+ on AUDIT). Around 40% of probation cases who were classified as either hazardous, harmful or possibly dependant drinkers on AUDIT were not identified by OASys. The results indicate that the prevalence of AUD in offenders is much higher than in the general population. In addition, current methods of identifying offenders with alcohol‐related need in probation are flawed and as many such people go undetected. Alcohol assessment procedures need to be improved in criminal justice setting order to correctly identify people with AUD.