International Postgraduate Research Conference (IPRC)
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Item A Study on Factors Affect on Acquiring English as a Second Language(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Lokuliyana, A.; Ruwanpathirana, I.English language skill is considered as one of most required skills in both educational and professional sectors in the modern society. After completing the school education students get chance to enter the state universities and this is where a graduate is being made according to universal aspects. Mass Communication and Public Relations are two global subjects which have been taught from very long time and English language skill is essential in both subjects in order to explore the academic and professional sector equally. However, every student is not given that privilege of learning the language properly. Especially when it comes to the non-urban areas of Sri Lanka, English language literacy is very law and in some areas it is zero. When a language is taught, the four skills of reading, speaking, writing and listening should be improved. During the process of learning, learner is affected by many factors in the second language acquisition process. The purpose of this research is to identify the ethnographic facts which affect on acquiring English as a second language. Under the qualitative research approach a questionnaire was distributed among 100 undergraduates who were selected randomly from the Department of Mass Communication. Additional information was gathered from secondary data sources such as research articles. It was proven by this study that undergraduates who belong to an upper social class background showed higher levels of English acquisition. At the same time it was revealed that undergraduates, who don’t belong to that social class but still showed higher levels of English acquisition, highly depend on school and private institution for learning English. The most important fact which was emerged through this research is, learning the alphabet and grammar do not support to acquire the language to the expected extent as long as there is a lack of practice in all levels of language acquisition. Contrary to these findings, it was also found out from this study that the undergraduates were highly motivated to learn English. However, higher motivation in itself did not result in higher levels of English acquisition for all undergraduatesItem Straddled Boundaries of Health Care in a Sri Lankan Village: A Medico-Anthropological Analysis(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Perera, J.A.P.S.; Angammana, B.H.Medical Pluralism (MP) is a vital phenomenon, deeply focused and widely studied in Medical Anthropology and Medical Sociology. Sri Lanka is a medically pluralistic country which offers a wide array of health care/treatment options which are available and utilized successively, alternatively, and/or simultaneously. However, the scholarship on MP in the Sri Lankan context mainly carries the biomedical perspective. In this background, we explored how socio-cultural factors and structures shape MP in a Sri Lankan rural village while there is a rapid proliferation of bio-medicine and health care technologies ranging from basic rural dispensaries to e-health facilities at the macro level. Our objectives were to; identify the dynamics of MP in the chosen village, identify how pluralist medical environment influence the health seeking behavior of the villagers and identify the reasons to cross/straddle and continue medically pluralistic situation in the village. This was an ethnographic study conducted in Dorakumbura Village in Matale district in 2018. The method of data collection included observations, interviews (10), and focus group discussions (05) conducted with a wide array of respondents (ranging from peasants, traditional healers, exorcists, astrologers, doctor, nurses, treatment seekers, to village administrative and related stake holders). We adopted the narrative analysis as the method of data analysis. The research revealed that there are three main sectors of medical pluralism; popular sector, folk sector and professional sector and villagers adopt a combination of treatment practices drawing from local, regional and cosmopolitan medical systems. Kinship and family ties still play a major role in transmitting the traditional knowledge on diseases and related treatments among the villagers studied. The peasants revealed very divers health beliefs and they follow diverse health care/treatment practices from various health traditions which are based on a wide range of social, cultural, ecological and structural factors that shape people’s choices and decisions on health. Although there seems to be a co-existence of several treatment traditions among the villagers, bio-medicine still exerts dominance. Further, cultural propensities and religious faith play a significant role in shaping pluralistic medical practices among villagers studiedItem Investigating the Effectiveness of Social Media and Traditional Media Marketing on the Purchase Intention of Fashion Brands in Sri Lanka(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Liyanage, N.N.Today, the marketing communication methods are evolving rapidly due to the rise of social media. Some companies totally depend on social media sites on their marketing communications and while most of the matured business organisations utilize both. Since there are mixed arguments the marketing practitioners are keen to understand the impact of the consumer purchase intention through both marketing communication modes. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the effectiveness of both social media and traditional media marketing on the purchase intention of the fashion brands in Sri Lanka. It aims to investigate whether people rely on one channel or whether they consider both media when making a purchase. The study further aims to identify how both marketing modes motivates people to make the final decision of purchase. A self-administered questionnaire is distributed among 123 Facebook users, the sample consists of both male and female and employed and unemployed who are in-between 20-50 years of age category and residing in Colombo and suburb Among 118 responses received 100 completed questionnaires were finally employed for statistical analysis. Sample was selected based on non-random sampling method. Among the existing literature on purchase intention the Theory of Reasoned Actions (TRA) is utilized to serve the purpose. According to the theory the independent variables are Attitude, Subjective Norms and External Variables and this study use the same variables as independent variables. The researcher selected quantitative research methodology adopting to the deductive research approach. The results of the empirical study show that both traditional communications and social media communications have a significant impact on consumer purchase intention and also the consumers suggest that those two mediums should be integrated/synergised to serve them better. The results provide evidence to say that the traditional media has a stronger impact on creating awareness while social media communications strongly influence brand image. Firm-created social media communication is shown to have an important impact on creating attitudes and making them engaged with it.Item Contemporary Situation of Film Marketing Practice in Sri Lanka(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Ruwanpathirana, I.Film is an art form which is basically to entertain people through visual storytelling. On the other hand it’s a business which has been a huge revenue driver in the entertainment industry. However, not all films succeed with high profit margins. Success of a film depends on various functions and Film Marketing is one of them. According to the Film Marketing hand book “any activity that assists a film in reaching its target audience at any time throughout its life” is called as Film Marketing. The main stages of activity in the film industry are development, production, post-production, distribution and exhibition and there is a need to focus on marketing in all of these stages. Despite the very high number of Sri Lankan film halls, audience and film sales are very low. However, a cinema without audience doesn’t make any sense. Having audience is considered as a requirement for prosperity and development of the movie industry. This is where the importance of marketing a movie emerges. The aim of this research was to study the contemporary situation of Film Marketing practice in Sri Lanka. The research was conducted as a systematic inquiry. Secondary data were articulated such as books, research articles, articles on journals, newspapers, web sites and these materials were sufficiently utilized for the analysis. Due to the lack of secondary data related to film marketing practice in Sri Lanka, primary data were collected by interviews. Ten film directors, five film producers and three academics who research on film industry in Sri Lanka were selected using purposive and judgmental sampling technique. The research revealed that though world’s most lucrative film industries (Bollywood, Hollywood) has provided interesting case studies for Film Marketing, many of Sri Lankans even those within the film industry, understand marketing activities as the creation of posters and trailers, advertising and promotional activities in advance of a film’s release. They have no idea about the bigger picture of Film Marketing. On the other hand many film industry professionals do not regard what they do as marketing, although on a daily basis they are packaging each film and marketing it to a number of people.Item Legal Barriers Faced by Female Entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Jayawardane, V.P.TAccording to the data obtained from the Women’s Chamber of Industry and Commerce Sri Lanka, there is a significant increase in the number of female entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka over the past decade. Sri Lankan female entrepreneurs play a significant role contributing to the economic development of the country. These female entrepreneurs work for the common good of the society, while looking for opportunities and utilizing them for their own betterment. There are many challenges faced by female entrepreneurs during the course of their ventures including economic, political, technological and legal constraints. The objective of this paper is to examine the legal barriers the Sri Lankan female entrepreneurs come across during the course of their business venture. The study was done with secondary data obtained from materials from the Central Bank of Sri Lanka along with data obtained from a survey research conducted by the author, of a population consisting 200 interviews. The standardized five point’s Likert questionnaire which was used by many researchers with a proven reliability and validity was used and a few personal interviews were done with female entrepreneurs chosen from random sampling. A qualitative analysis was conducted to analyse the data and the results proved that the legal factors affect the decision making of female entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka. In addition, the research identified various legal barriers which affect and influence the female entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka. This paper will propose some solutions to help overcome these legal barriers. The paper recommends that Sri Lanka ought to imply strong policies and national laws, which can be implemented to offer solutions to address these concerns.Item Study on Contemporary Ayurveda Practice in Sri Lanka Overview to the Policy and Issues(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Gunathilaka, P.G.I.Introduction: Traditional medicine plays a significant role of the Health Care delivery system in Sri Lanka. Traditional and natural medicine has long ancient history of effective diagnosis and treatment. Unfortunately, there is a lack of scientific research to support this history. Ayurveda Healthcare professionals should have adequate knowledge, skills and correct attitudes regarding Ayurveda Medical Practice in order to control adverse consequences related to contemporary Ayurveda practice. Objective: This study was conducted to assess the gap in registration of Ayurveda Physicians in different categories (Graduated physicians, Physicians with diploma and Traditional practitioners) due to educational qualifications by accessing the standard of Ayurveda Health care practice in Sri Lanka using education, knowledge, attitudes and practices of Ayurveda practitioners regarding Ayurveda Healthcare practice among Ayurveda physicians working at Western Province Ayurveda Department, Practitioners with Diploma and Traditional practitioners. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted using a self-administered questionnaire in a sample of Ayurveda Physicians. A convenient sample of 100 registered physicians were selected from the graduated physicians, physicians with diploma and hereditary physicians in the Western Province, Sri Lanka SPSS software was utilized under the guidance of the statistician and data presented in a sound manner safeguarding the existing policy frame work and guide line of the Ministry of Health, Ayurveda Medical council and International Institute of Health Science (IIHS). Results: Policy regulations on registration of differently qualified Physicians and the standard of practice related to Ayurveda Healthcare practice were the areas that need attention from the health authorities. The majority of physicians had a positive attitude regarding policy change of registration of physicians at Medical Council. Significant positive associations between knowledge and attitudes, knowledge and practices were observed in this study. It meant that those who possess good knowledge also have good attitudes and good levels of practices. So, knowledge is an important factor in standard Ayurveda Health Care practice and this should be emphasized in future strategies. Discussion and Conclusion: The different categories of Ayurvedic physicians register in a same register at SLAMC creates an important issue while providing Ayurveda Healthcare service Knowledge gaps found in the study should be considered in future training that are designed for Ayurveda Physicians in different categories. Attitudinal changes and associated behavioral changes that are needed from Ayurveda Physicians especially diploma and traditional practitioners in this process of standard Ayurveda medical practice should be discussed at top administration level in order to identify effectiveness of interventions. Practices related to standard Ayurveda Medical system among Ayurveda Physicians could be improved by increasing their knowledge, education, training and also by providing necessary equipment and infrastructure needed for the relevant activity such as workshops, training programs and guide them to conduct researches on Ayurveda MedicinesItem A Time-Series Analysis of the Incidence of Leishmaniasis Integrated with Climatic Variables in Kurunegala District, Sri Lanka(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Wijerathna, T.; Gunathilaka, N.; Gunawardena, K.; Rodrigo, W.Leishmaniasis is one of the main health considerations in the tropical areas of the world. The disease is caused by the parasites of genus Leishmania, which is transmitted from one host to another through female Phlebotomine sand flies. The information on the correlation between weather conditions and leishmaniasis in Sri Lanka is limited. However, studies from other tropical countries suggest that leishmaniasis is highly influenced by climatic variables, but the nature and magnitude of these effects may differ from one geographical region to another. In the current study, we conducted a time series analysis of the number of patients reported from Kurunegala District of Sri Lanka integrating climatic factors as external regressors. Monthly reported cases of lesihmaniasis from January 2014 to December 2018 in Kurunegala District were tracked from the Regional Director of Health Services (RDHS) office. The climatic factors recorded from regional Agro meteorological stations in Kurunegala District were obtained. A time series of the number of patients was created using “tseries” package of R statistical software. The variance of the time series was stabilized by log transformation. The “forecast” package of R software was used to generate an ARIMA model. Resulting model was slightly changed based on the partial autocorrelation function (PACF) plot, the autocorrelation function (ACF) plot, and the number of differences required to achieve the stationarity of the time series. These models were assessed by Akaike information criterion for goodness-of-fit. Spearman’s rank correlation and cross-autocorrelation tests were performed to assess the associations between the number of patients and climatic variables at different lags. The most associated lags of each factor was used as external regressors in a multivariate ARIMA model to assess the effects of climatic factors on the predictive power of the model. The application of “auto.arima” function of forecast package to the log transformed and differenced time series of the number of patients resulted in the model ARIMA (1,1,0), which is also the selected model as it had the lowest AIC among the models generated by changing the values of autoregressive (p), integrative (d), and moving average (q) terms of the model. The time independency of the residual series according to the Ljung–Box test further confirmed the suitability of this model for forecasting. The maximum temperature and the relative humidity were positively correlated with the occurrence of leishmaniasis at 1 and 3 months’ lag periods respectively, which can be plausibly explained by the conditions being favorable for vector sand flies and the climate driven changes in host immunity. However, the integration of climatic factors did not increase the predictive power of the model, indicating the possibility of a latent interaction effect between the climate and the regressing terms (AR and MA) of the model or a stochastic mechanism of interactions between weather factors and leishmaniasis incidence Therefore, the climatic factors, despite their effects on the disease incidence, cannot be used to improve the predictive power of the ARIMA model.Item Influence of Personal Factors on Whistleblowing Among Accountants in Sri Lanka(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Shifana, Y.F.Whistle blowing plays a crucial role in preventing unethical behavior in organizations. Previous studies on whistleblowing behavior have been conducted in various cultural context and identified the influence of employees’ personal factors on whistle blowing behavior, but results of these studies were inconsistent. This study aims to deepening the understanding of whistle blowing behavior by identifying the influence of employee’s personal factors (age, gender, and experience) on their both internal and external whistle blowing in Sri Lankan cultural context. This study was conducted among 52 accountants in Sri Lanka. T-test and ANOVA were employed to test if there is any significant differences in whistle blowing behavior (internal and external) related to these personal factors. This study found that age, gender and experience have an influence on both internal and external whistle blowing behavior. Younger (M= 2.3), female (M=3.1) and less experienced employees (2.4) engage in low level of internal whistle blowing compare to older (M=2.9), male (M=4.1) and high experienced (M= 4.7) employees. Regarding to external whistle blowing behavior there is no significant differences in whistle blowing behaviors between male (M= 3.8) and females (M= 3.4), but there is a significant difference in whistle blowing regarding age and experience. Younger (M= 3.1) employees and less experienced (M = 4.0) employees are highly engaged in external whistle blowing than older (M = 1.9) and more experienced (2.1) employees. Mean differences were significant at 0.05 significance levels. Further this study found that younger and less experienced employees are highly engaged in external whistle blowing than internal whistle blowing. Findings of this study highlights the individual differences in whistle blowing behavior in Sri Lankan context that help organization to motivate internal whistle blowing and demotivate external whistle blowing of employees. This study contributes to the literature by examining the influence of personal factors in both internal and external whistle blowing among accountants in Sri Lankan cultural context which was unnoticed in the literature.Item Influence of Corporate Governance on Leverage Structure in Sri Lankan Manufacturing Companies(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Perera, P.; Perera, P.R.M.R.Leverage structure of manufacturing companied provide an indication of the financial health of the company, while number of factors affect the leverage structure decision. Governance is the mechanism that controls decisions of the company that includes leverage structure decisions. The objective of this study is to examine the influence of corporate governance on leverage structure decision making in Sri Lankan manufacturing firms. Data collected from annual reports of manufacturing sector companies for the period from 2014 to 2018 were analyzed using panel data. The study identified board size, board composition, managerial ownership, board independence, institutional ownership and CEO duality as corporate governance attributes to measure their influence on leverage structure decision making. Firm Size and profitability were employed for control purpose. Findings of the study reveal a significant influence of corporate governance attributes of CEO duality and board independence on leverage structure with a moderate effect of firm Size and profitabilityItem Firm Characteristics and Intellectual Capital Disclosure: Evidence from Sri Lanka(International Postgraduate Research Conference 2019, Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2019) Weerawickrama, V.; Perera, P.The purpose of this study is to examine the level of voluntary intellectual capital disclosure (ICD) by Sri Lankan listed companies and to evaluate four main company characteristics; industry type, listing age, leverage and auditor type on ICD. In current context ICD has identified as one of the most significant factors in creating and maintaining stakeholder value and gaining competitive advantages for the organization. Majority of these disclosures are qualitative, non-financial and historical oriented. In this study the level of ICD is examined in all non-financial traded companies (222) listed in the Colombo Stock Exchange using content analysis for the period of 2016 to 2018. The results of the study show that; the industry type has a significant impact on the disclosure level while, listing age and leverage did not show any significant influence on ICD. Further, knowledge-intensive and high technology-based industries as well as companies with Big Four auditors showed higher level of ICD than other companies. All other companies except previously mentioned, showed a homogeneous disclosure patterns over time. This study contributes new insights to the existing literature on ICD in Sri Lanka as the first study to consider all listed non-financial companies, while inviting future researchers to conduct more ICD related research for a considerable time period with different content analysis techniques.