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Suicide among adolescent has emerged as a major public health issue in many low and middle-income (LAMI) countries. Suicidal behavior including ideation and attempt are the most important predictors of completed suicide and offer critical points for intervention. This article reviews recent population and national data based studies of adolescent suicide and suicide attempters for analyzing risk factors for adolescent suicide and suicidal behavior. According to WHO estimates, 800,000 suicide deaths occurred worldwide in 2016 and it is the third leading cause of death for 15-19 year olds. The suicide rate in Bangladesh was 5.9 per 100,000 population in 2016 (4.7 for males and 7.0 for females). Approximately, 90 percent of suicide cases meet criteria for a psychiatric disorder, particularly major depression, substance abuse and prior suicide attempts are strongly related to adolescent suicides. The relationship between psychiatric disorders and adolescent suicide is now well established. Factors related to family adversity, social alienation and precipitating problems also contribute to the risk of suicide. The main target of effective prevention of adolescent suicides is to reduce suicide risk factors. Recognition and effective management and control of psychiatric disorders, e.g. depression, are essential in preventing adolescent suicides. Research on the treatment of diagnosed depressive disorders and of those with suicidal behavior is reviewed.

This commentary looks at the social stigma as a barrier to Covid-19 responses to community well-being in Bangladesh. The Covid-19 in Bangladesh particular the way the people respond this has many dimensions to view from sociological perspective. The main objective of this commentary is to analysis how this response is related to social stigma. Gathering information from the recent literature, results showed that there are number of causes around such stigma that include misinformation, feeling of insecurity, fear of responsibility, administrative malfunction, and lack of trust on treatment. These causes of stigma have number of forms such as humor-prone stigma, residential stigma, organizational stigma, community-stigma, and apathetical stigma. Results also show that there are many effects of stigma such as health-risks, harassment, discrimination, life-insecurity, psychological disorder, loss of social capital and emotional capital, shattering family bond and social solidarity that work as barrier to community well-being. This commentary recommends to overcome the barriers through strengthening and decentralization of the COVID-19 medical facilities including testing, tracing, formal quarantining, and special treatment for coronavirus in coronavirus hospitals by allocating a large figure of the state budget and also by taking initiatives of public-private partnership for health management.

We explore the COVID-19 pandemic in the way South Asian poor local communities experience health and income hazards and whether they prioritize their lives or put their lives on the line to earn a ...

This paper looks at the dynamism of culture, poverty and development between two countries: India and Bangladesh. There is evidence that poverty is related with culture and this synergy is related with development and vice-versa. This evidence is much more unified within these two countries. A Qualitative Interpretative Meta-Synthesis (QIMS) was conducted to analyze the current literature on the dynamism of culture, poverty and development. Results showed that culture, poverty and development are interning each other, and this interning is a factual in India and Bangladesh. The paper clearly shows that due to the cultural backwardness in India and Bangladesh, many people could not come out from the poverty line. As a result, the achievement of the development indicators in both countries is still slow. This paper argues that culture in all its multiple forms is essential to address the poverty as well as development. The findings of the paper would be important guideline to the development practitioners, NGO workers and development policy makers.

Environment and disaster are two important concepts that have wide implications in our daily lives. This kind of education is more important to the children for ensuring their protection. This education helps them participate in decision-making processes in different stages of their lives that will ultimately impact their future. We identify the numbers and sizes of the titles, elements, and learning outcomes related to the environment and disaster curricula used in the Secondary School (grades VI to X) in Bangladesh, and find the cross-cutting issues, gaps of the curricula, and finally, provide some suggestions. We use content analysis, focus group discussions, and interviews with key informants’ interviews for data collection. Our results show that there are a total of 115 titles on the environment and disasters in the secondary school curricula. Disaster-related titles are numerous than those related to the environment. We record 210 items of contents focus on the environment and 145 disasters. However, some overlap is noted. The highest number of contents (133) focuses on the natural environment followed by 46 on social issues and 31 on physical themes. According to the grade-wise distribution, the highest numbers of contents are found in grade IX–X followed by 62 in grade VII, then 47 in grade VI with the lowest 19 in grade VIII. The subject-wise data analysis showed that the highest 95 contents were found on Agricultural Studies followed by 65 in English For Today, 54 in Science, and 36 each in Geography and Environment and Bangladesh and Global Studies in all classes. The study found some gaps and limitations in terms of its sequence regarding the learning outcomes of the curricula. We propose that an urgent review is needed to assess the whole curricula to reconsider and rearrange as needed for fetching the sequence across the subjects and grades. Our findings are of relevance to policymakers, education specialists, education practitioners, and school teachers.

Shape memory alloys (SMAs) are classified as smart materials due to their capacity to display shape memory effect and pseudoelasticity with changing temperature and loading conditions. The thermomechanical behavior of SMAs has been simulated by several constitutive models that adopted microscopic thermodynamic or macroscopic phenomenological approaches. The Ivshin&ndash, Pence model is one of the most popular SMA macroscopic phenomenological constitutive models. The construction of the model requires involvement of parameters that possess inherent uncertainty. Under varying operating temperatures and loading conditions, the uncertainty in these parameters propagates and, therefore, affects the predictive power of the model. The propagation of uncertainty while using this model in real-life applications can result in performance discrepancies or failure at extreme conditions. In this study, we employed a probabilistic approach to perform the sensitivity and uncertainty analysis of the Ivshin&ndash, Pence model. Sobol and extended Fourier Amplitude Sensitivity Testing (eFAST) methods were used to perform the sensitivity analysis for simulated isothermal loading/unloading at various operating temperatures. It is evident that the model&rsquo, s prediction of the SMA stress&ndash, strain curves varies due to the change in operating temperature and loading condition. The average and stress-dependent sensitivity indices present the most influential parameters at several temperatures.

The main objective of this study was to investigate the nature of the traditional practices of the Panchayat system, and depict its present status and roles of the judicial services among ex-enclaves in Bangladesh. Four ex-enclaves of Panchagarh district namely the Dahala Khagrabari, Kothajni, Putimari, and Garati of Bangladesh were chosen as study areas. This study used a mixed method approach, wherea social survey was conducted with 124 household heads with a semi-structured questionnaire for quantitative data; and eight in-depth interviews, five focus group discussions (FGDs) and four key informants’ interviews (KIIs) were carried out for qualitative data. Results showed that the unfortunate enclave residents were never been introduced to court and judiciary system, where the role of Panchayat in terms of law and order was biased as they could not protect the enclave dwellers from the influential persons and outsiders’ attack. The Panchayet could not control these influential persons’ illegal practices. In most of the cases, they grabbed enclave dwellers’ lands through forged documents. The study also explored that the women and girls children of the enclaves were often raped by the local gangs and persons. Sometimes they snatched them to their own residence and sexually harassed them. No one had access to justice on the issues such as murder, killing, rape or land grabbing. The findings would be an important guideline to the government officials, NGO managers, legal advocates and development practitioners.

This study aimed to examine the influence of the traditional leadership qualities towards to develop community cohesion in the Iban community in Malaysia. A quantitative approach was used to conduct this study, where data were collected through a self-administered survey questionnaire from 210 chiefs in the Iban longhouse at the Pakan District in Sarawak, Malaysia. A pre-tested questionaire was administrered to the respondents using a simple random sampling in the District of Pakan, Sarawak. The leadership quality was measured based on the leadership traits, leadership style, leadership behaviour, situational leadership, and trsnformational leadership; while the community cohesion was measured by a sense of belonging, social alienation, social support, rootedness, social solidarity, and social ties. The results of the correlation and regression analysis showed that the traditional leadership qualities had a significant correlation with the development of social cohesion. The findings proved that the traditional leadership is essential to increase community cohesion in the Iban community. The findings would be important guideline to the development thinkers, practitioners, community leaders, and development institutions., Iban community; community development; Malaysia; leadership quality; Leadership; community cohesion; Social Sciences; Economics; Sociology; Social Organisation; Human Rights

A shape memory alloy (SMA) can remember its original shape and recover from strain due to loading once it is exposed to heat (shape memory effect). SMAs also exhibit elastic response to applied stress above the characteristic temperature at which transformation to austenite is completed (pseudoelasticity or superelasticity). Shape memory effect and pseudoelasticity of SMAs have been addressed by several microscopic thermodynamic and macroscopic phenomenological models using different modeling approaches. The Tanaka and Liang-Rogers models are two of the most widely used macroscopic phenomenological constitutive models for describing SMA behavior. In this paper, we performed sensitivity and uncertainty analysis using Sobol and extended Fourier Amplitude Sensitivity Testing (eFAST) methods for the Tanaka and Liang-Rogers models at different operating temperatures and loading conditions. The stress-dependent and average sensitivity indices have been analyzed and are presented for determining the most influential parameters for these models. The results show that variability is primarily caused by a change in operating temperature and loading conditions. Both models appear to be influenced by the uncertainty in elastic modulus of the material significantly. The analyses presented in this paper aim to provide a better insight for designing applications using SMAs by increasing the understanding of these models&rsquo, sensitivity to the input parameters and the cause of output variability due to uncertainty in the same input parameters.

This paper presented two non-governmental organizations’ (NGOs’) social capital development initiatives for social welfare in Bangladesh. This study was based on a qualitative case study approach using a multi-method data collection procedure, where a semi-structured interview, social mapping, participant observation, in-depth case study, focus group discussion (FGD), and documentation survey were employed. The study selected two NGOs such as Proshika and Practical Action Bangladesh (PAB) working with two indigenous communities, e.g. blacksmiths and goldsmiths. This paper considered the application of the main elements of social capital such as collective actions, social trust, coordination and cooperation of mutual benefits, and sharing norms and values. The findings showed that in many cases, NGOs’ social capital development initiatives for social welfare were successful. The findings would be useful for the social workers, policy makers, development practitioners, and NGO managers.

This paper looks at the rights of the people with disabilities (PWDs) in the connection of social exclusion in Malaysia. The paper briefly reviews the current disability laws and national policies and find out the gaps and weaknesses of these documents. This paper shows how the rights of disabled people in Malaysia are associated with the process of social exclusion. By reviewing a number of studies, this paper offers a dimension of social exclusion, where the disabled people are depriving from their rights and excluding from the development arenas. The development practitioners, policy makers, and relevant governmental and non-governmental officials find some significant guidelines from this paper.

This paper explores the features of child trafficking in Bangladesh and then addresses the responses of the governmental and non-governmental organizations (GOs and NGOs) to the problem. It aims at analysing the sources and causes of child trafficking. The paper also aims to discuss the current initiatives of the GOs and NGOs with its limitations, and finally provides some way out alternatives. The paper argues that the GO-NGO responses are inadequate in the light of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) in Bangladesh. The paper contributes a dynamic and multidimensional understanding of how the GOs and NGOs combating child trafficking issue in Bangladesh.

This paper presents a pen picture about the changes of livelihood patterns to the char people, mostly living under poverty in Bangladesh. The study was conducted on the three Northern Districts such as Nilphamari, Lalmonirhat and Pabna in Bangladesh, where the Char Resources Mobilization project was provided by an international non-government organization—Concern Worldwide Bangladesh. The study used mixed method approach where quantitative data were collected from 378 households (126 from each District) using structured interview schedule. A number of qualitative data collection methods such as focus group discussion, participant observation, community mapping, case study, and key informants interview guidelines were used to collect data about the conditions of the Char people in terms of understanding its connection with their livelihoods and socio-economic consequences. This study compares the changes with influential factors with a baseline survey conducted in 2007. Findings showed that there were a number of areas such as education, income, family assets and properties, annual household income, employment, savings, improving market chain, food intake and food security, presence of governmental and non-governmental organizations’ services and awareness about disaster and vulnerability and coping strategies were found positive. The study also observed some negative changes on assets base and livelihood options. The paper argues that the findings on these changes will help to formulate policy on poverty alleviation for the government and non-government authorities who implement the similar type of programmes.

This paper explores the nature and causes of social exclusion of the NGOs’ activities in Bangladesh. Data gathered from two NGOs (Proshika and Practical Action Bangladesh) working for the socio-economic development in Bangladesh. The paper shows that now a day the NGOs’ target groups and services have been specified to the people who are able to return back their micro-credit. As a result many people are now being excluded from NGO services who are known as ‘ultra poor’. The findings of this paper show that many blacksmiths and goldsmiths were out of services from both NGOs rather the NGOs selected purposeful target groups, replicate of program, and their short-term development approach, high-flying profile, rent seeking attitude, monolithic development approach, lack of accountability, complex loan procedure and high interest rate, and cut-off budget from their development project were helpful for such kind of social exclusion. The paper argues that that without inclusion of such groups of people, the overall socio-economic development would not be possible.

Time-shifted source functions along with unwanted events produce the composite seismic trace. The time-shift varies according to the travel path of the source, which is reflected back from an interface. The arrival times of the reflected waves have been estimated as time-shifted sources in a technique with the application of Fourier transformation of composite seismic trace and source functions. Accurate time-shifts and amplitude coefficients are determined using the technique in the composite seismic traces. A very small time-shift has also been shown resolved. The technique is applied to INDEPTH seismic data and impulse responses are successfully obtained. Analyzed impulse response images have given the stratigraphic idea beneath the region of the central Tibet. High amplitude impressions in the implemented images have indicated the presence of a strong support that upholding the northern geology and high probability of further crustal change of the region. The technique impulse response is considered robust for the seismic reflection sequence analysis and can be used effectively for studying the subsurface geology.   Keywords : Seismic trace; Power spectrum; Impulse response; Reflection sequence; Subsurface geology.  © 2009 JSR Publications. ISSN: 2070-0237 (Print); 2070-0245 (Online). All rights reserved.  DOI: 10.3329/jsr.v1i1.1082

This article considers the role of non-government organizations (NGOs) in term of their capacity as agents of community empowerment in Bangladesh. The article investigates the application of community empowerment using the domains provided by Laverack (2006). The article is based on qualitative research focusing on two NGOs in Bangladesh: Proshika and Practical Action Bangladesh (PAB) and their work in two communities, one urban and the other rural. The data are obtained from two indigenous occupants: blacksmiths and goldsmiths. The article argues that NGOs in Bangladesh are potential agents of community empowerment, but there are obstacles which limit this.