Breast Cancer Case Study - 929 Words

Discussion In the present study, we found that rate of pCR to neoadjuvant chemotherapy was 24.7% (n=25) in the whole cohort (n=101). This finding was consistent with the range of pCR rates to prospective randomized trials of preoperative chemotherapy of 15%-40% mentioned in the literature (Burstein et al., 2008). Moreover, high Ki-67 expression (cutoff 14%) was significantly correlated with achieving a pCR in the large cohort (p=0.016). This result matched with the finding of several studies that reported that high Ki-67 expression was associated with higher response rates to neoadjuvant chemotherapy in breast cancer (Keam et al., 2011). Also, our study revealed that TNBC patients accounted for about 23% of the whole cohort of invasive†¦show more content†¦Similarly, Liu et al. (2013) gave 7 cycles of platinum-based neo-adjuvant chemotherapy in 717 patients, of whom 31% were TNBC, and found that the clinical complete response (cCR) rate and the pathological complete response (pCR) rates were significantly higher in TNBC group than in non-TNBC one. However, the low pCR rate achieved by our TNBC cases was close to that reported in a small study at Dana Farber Cancer Institute, where 26 TNBC patients received six cycles of neoadjuvant single-agent cisplatin, and only4 (15%) achieved complete response (CR), after exclusion of two cases with BRCA mutation (Silver et al., 2010). Similarly, Bidard et al., reported a pCR rate of 17% in a relatively large cohort of TNBC group (n=120) receiving a combined neoadjuvant chemotherapy regimen composed of cyclophosphamide, epirubicin and 5-fluorouracil (CEF) for 4 to 6 cycles (Bidard et al., 2008). Our low pCR rate in TNBC subgroup might be also explained by the type of chemotherapeutic agents that had been used. Rocca and colleagues conducted a retrospective analysis of core biopsies of patients with breast cancer treated with neoadjuvant cisplatin-based chemotherapy in breast cancer and showed that administration of cisplatin without anthracyclines yielded a higher rate of pCR in patients with p63-positive tumors (Rocca et al., 2008). Again, our low pCR rate in TNBC might be also explained by the heterogeneousShow MoreRelatedBreast Cancer Case Study1234 Words   |  5 Pagesultimately lead to the progression of oral cancer. (Lee et al, 2010). c‑myc was among the first oncogenes found to be amplified in breast cancer, and it can contribute to many other forms of cancer (Victoria and Michael, 2007). It is a critical downstream effector of the Wnt/TCF pathway in colon cancer and activation of Myc might play a predominant role in the pathogenesis of tumors like pediatric hepatoblastoma (Sansom et al, 2007; Cairo et al, 2008). A study done in south Indian population has shownRead MoreBreast Cancer Case Study803 Words   |  4 Pagessecondary organs fibronectin expression is upregulated by primary tumors via resident fibroblasts, which serves as a docking site for VEGFR1+ hematopoietic progenitor cell (HPC) clusters and secondary seeding. During metastasis of breast cancer to lung, interaction of VCAM-1+ cancer cells with VLA-4-expressing macrophages, activates PI3K/Akt signaling in tumor cells, protecting them from caspase-induced apoptosis. Bone metastasis is also facilitated by interaction of VCAM1 with different integrin partnerRead MoreBreast Cancer Case Study1306 Words   |  6 Pagesmetastases have caused substantial mortality and morbidity in cancer patients. Approximately 15% of women with breast cancer will be diagnosed with brain metastases (Zakaria et al., 2014). With early diagnosis and appropriate treatment, the quality of the patient’s life could be enhanced. Therefore, it is vital for patients with a known primary tumour to undergo imaging studies once they develop neurological signs and symptoms. Imaging studies aid to accurately identify the type, number, size, and locationRead MoreEssay on Breast Cancer Case Study642 Words   |  3 Pagesï » ¿Luis F Vega Jr NUR 1211 Breast Cancer Case Study Mrs. Thomas, a 57 year old married lawyer, was found to have a 4 X 6 cm firm, fixed mass in the upper, outer quadrant of the right breast during a routine physical examination, and a stereotactic core biopsy indicated a malignant tumor. Although the surgeon recommended a mastectomy because of the size of the tumor, Mrs. Thomas chose to have a lumpectomy. Now three weeks postoperative, she is scheduled for chemotherapy. Subjective Data NeverRead MoreAdult Case Study : Male Breast Cancer3050 Words   |  13 Pages Adult Case Study: Male Breast Cancer Carly Regan Loyola University Chicago Introduction Overview When the topic of breast cancer is discussed in conversation, most will think of it as a female diagnosis. While the greatest percentages of patients diagnosed with breast cancer are female, it is still possible that males can be diagnosed. It is a diagnosis that practitioners should always keep in the back of their minds as a differential when a male presentsRead MoreBreat Cancer Screening Essay1514 Words   |  7 PagesBREAST CANCER SCREENING DR. DANA MORTEZ ARLECIA PURVIS JULY 17, 2011 Current research shows mammograms are stronger than in the past. In a recent study it has confirmed that mammograms benefit for women in their forties and fifties. Women feel confident about the benefits that are associated with a regular mammograms for finding cancer early. However, mammograms can have their limitations. A mammogram will miss some cancers, and it sometimes can leadRead MoreThe Treatment Of Breast Cancer1309 Words   |  6 Pages Introduction: Breast cancer is the most common malignant disease occurring in women in Saudi society. After study and research, it found that two-thirds of the injuries in the Saudi society are diagnosed in advanced stages. The reasons for that are the lack of education for necessary of Self-examination and clinical examination annual, leading to the spread of the disease further. In addition to genetic changes, environmental pollution, bad lifestyle , Obesity ,Lack of exercise are also factorsRead MoreGenome Wide Association Studies Essay1142 Words   |  5 Pageswide association study has been very useful in the recent years. It has helped researchers to detect genes that are not detected that easily. With the detection, it helps the researchers to prevent and treat the particular disease. Breast cancer has been one of the most common cancer in the world and the most common in women. Even though, breast cancer is detected easily with mammograms or self examination there are times where it c an be hard to detect. Genome wide association studies help to identifyRead MoreBreast Cancer : A Malignant Tumor1203 Words   |  5 PagesChapter I - Introduction Breast cancer is defined as a malignant tumor in the cells of the breast. A cancerous tumor develops when a group of malignant cells invade the tissue surrounding the breast and can spread to other parts of the body (Cancer.org, 2015). This type of cancer is most common in women. However, men can also fall victim to the disease. In 2015, about 230,000 new cases of breast cancer will be diagnosed in women and approximately 40,000 women will die from this disease (CancerRead MoreStrength Of Association1146 Words   |  5 Pagesrule out causality and may still be of significant effect on the disease under study. This is applied in a case where the exposure is in a common population. For instance passive smoking and lung cancer (Risk Ratio: 1.3) (Morein Stuart, n.d). Consistency: Repeated observation of an association in a different population under different circumstances showing the same results suggests that the results of a single study are not due to chance. Criticism: This should be applied cautiously to avoid chances

Custom Written Essays Contrasting Gertrude and Ophelia...

Contrasting the Ladies in Hamlet How can anyone view or read the Shakespearean tragedy of Hamlet without observing an obvious differentiation between the characters of the two female characters? And yet, not all critics agree on even the most salient features of this contrast. Quite opposite the criminality of the king’s wife is the innocence of Ophelia – this view is generally expressed among Shakespearean critics. Jessie F. O’Donnell expresses the total innocence of the hero’s girlfriend in â€Å"Ophelia,† originally appearing in The American Shakespeare Magazine: O broken lily! how shall one rightly treat of her loveliness, her gentleness and the awful pathos of her fate? Who shall dare to hint that she was†¦show more content†¦Yet no one who reads the first soliloquy in the Second Quarto text, with its illuminating dramatic punctuation, can doubt for one moment that Shakespeare wished here to make full dramatic capital out of Gertrude’s infringement of ecclesiastical law [. . .] . (39) In the Introduction to Twentieth Century Interpretations of Hamlet, David Bevington analyzes the dissimilarity: â€Å"Characters also serve as foils to one another as well as to Hamlet. Gertrude wishfully sees in Ophelia the blushing bride of Hamlet, innocently free from the compromises and surrenders which Gertrude has never mastered the strength to escape† (9). Ophelia is so despondent at the death of Polonius and the alienation of Hamlet that she slips into madness – something that would never happen to Gertrude at the loss of a man. The queen has difficulty empathizing with the masculine point of view, even with that of her own son. She sees him attending the courtly social gathering in black, and refuses to tolerate it: Dear Hamlet, cast thy nighted color off, And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark. Do not for ever with thy vailed lids Seek for thy noble father in the dust. (1.2) Likewise she expresses her wishes that the prince â€Å"go not to Wittenberg.† Later, when the hero’s supposed â€Å"madness† is the big concern, Gertrude analyzes her son’s condition: â€Å"IShow MoreRelated Shakespeares Hamlet - The Character of Ophelia Essay3341 Words   |  14 PagesHamlet: The Character of Ophelia  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚        Ã‚   Concerning the Ophelia of Shakespeare’s tragic drama Hamlet, is she an innocent type or not? Is she a victim or not? This essay will explore these and other questions related to this character.    Rebecca West in â€Å"A Court and World Infected by the Disease of Corruption† viciously, and perhaps unfoundedly, attacks the virginity of Ophelia:    There is no more bizarre aspect of the misreading of Hamlet’s character than the assumptionRead MoreEssay on Interpreting Hamlet’s Ophelia3518 Words   |  15 PagesHamlet’s Ophelia Was Ophelia in love with Hamlet, or did she have more feeling for her father than for her boyfriend? In Shakespeare’s Hamlet was Ophelia’s madness contributed to by the prince’s rejection of her? The answers to these and other questions about this tragic figure will be given. Rebecca West in â€Å"A Court and World Infected by the Disease of Corruption† argues that Ophelia has no love for Hamlet, but only for her father: For the myth which has been built round Hamlet is never

Positive Psychology in the Workplace Free Essays

Positive Psychology in the Workplace Sandie Tharp University of Charleston English II Nada Najjar March 30th, 2013 Positive Psychology in the Workplace It has been proven that positive psychology in the workplace can improve and enhance workplace satisfaction because employees are more confident and are better able to manage stress and adversity. Employees that are happier with their work environment are typically more motivated and are more likely to pursue growth and development. Job satisfaction is an engine that drives organizations to success and keeps turnover rate to a minimum. We will write a custom essay sample on Positive Psychology in the Workplace or any similar topic only for you Order Now An article from Harvard Business Review states that â€Å"a decade of research proves that happiness raises nearly every business and educational outcome: raising sales by 37%, productivity by 31%, and accuracy on tasks by 19%, as well as a myriad of health and quality of life improvements† (2011, Archor). Additionally, the author Archor asks if there is anything that a company can do to affect employee happiness and should a company invest resources into happiness. One avenue to happiness is using training as a tool that can be used to help employees to learn to manage stress. The first step is explaining the goal of the organization and how the employee contributes to that goal. Clear goals and expectations set out the mile post marking the marathon, by having clearly marked points of achievement for individuals or teams giving them a clear map to their success. It’s the manager’s responsibility to verify the goals of the team members, identify the common goal, and verify that they are in alignment with the organization goals. The King James Version of the Bible states â€Å"train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it† (Proverbs. 2:6- King James Version). On the job training is the adult equivalent to raising a child. Putting subordinates on the path of success by providing the focus of the organizational instead of having the employee assuming or guessing about what to do causing stress and uncertainty. The economics of happiness in the workplace means that happy employees can help achieve organizational goals more easily because they are ready to give their best. Companies like Google and DreamWorks empower employees to use creative freedom in every day decision making. Google was a company that had to come up with a quick plan to reduce the turnover rate of their women employees because the turnover rate was affecting Google’s bottom line. In response, Google implemented a 5 month paid maternity plan, which gave new mothers the ability to take all the time upfront or to divide the time as needed. This new incentive plan reduced turnover by 50 percent among women and cost the firm no more than hiring a new employee. Google’s President Laszlo Bock, states â€Å"that if you factor in the savings in recruitment costs, granting mothers five months of leave doesn’t cost Google any more money† (2013,Manjool). The new maternity policy that Google has implemented exemplifies why Google has become one of the best employers in the world, taking a major cause of employee turnover from a crippling weakness to a world class strength. Carolinas Healthcare is a system that contains 32 affiliated hospitals in North and South Carolina and is one of the leading healthcare systems in the southeast; Carolinas Healthcare employs over 44,000 employees. Managing such a large number of employees would be a challenge for any organization, but CHS has stepped up to the plate and has met that challenge and is leading the way for positive work environment. During a recent employee survey conducted by Morehead and Associates, CHS ranked in the 90th percentile in the national ranking of employee satisfaction. Carolinas Healthcare System already has a reputation of being â€Å"An Employer of Choice,† recognized by the JD Power and Associates in 2011† (2012,Tarwater). This recognition has helped attracted top doctors and other medical professionals from all over the world. CHS concentrates on growth and expansion which helps generate excitement throughout the organization. Carolinas HealthCare System ecognizes that the employees are its most valuable asset and is dedicated to the growth and contentment of its employees. CHS recognizes that encouraging employees to continue educational growth will result in higher functioning, more competent workforce. Currently CHS offers an educational plan that reimburses employees for covered educational expenses and flexible scheduling around educational opportunities. Like Google with its maternity benefit, CHS has recognized that employees need and desire a clear path to growth and addresses this need with the educational assistance plan. Many organizations recognize the value of multiple bottom lines beyond monetary profit. Today the focus is on providing an environment based on positive interactions, outcomes and sustainability of the workforce. Organizations have come to realize that emotional intelligence and understanding is what allows employees to create positive interactions with customers and co-workers. According to Psych Central â€Å"research has shown that employees who are fully engaged in the work they do, and who have a sense of intrinsic motivation, are likely to perform better and a have better work outcomes† (2011, Wilner). To achieve these outcomes it is up to the organization to involve the employees and allow them to uncover their individual gifts and have the independence to use them for the common goals. Allowing employees to be involved gives them accountability for the success of the organization and a sense of pride, happiness and fulfillment. Positive psychology in the workplace can improve and enhance workplace satisfaction and have a positive impact on the organization’s bottom line. Companies like Google and Carolinas Healthcare understand the importance of a positive work environment. Both have provided pathways to fulfillment, whether through providing enhancement programs or through fostering positive interaction. Firms must continually look for avenues to promote growth, fulfillment and ultimately employee satisfaction if they are continue to improve the bottom line. It has been said that cheaper isn’t better; better is better. Today a better work force is cheaper than a cheap one. By continuing to harvest the fruits of a cohesive team built over time, an organization creates synergies that have a much greater return than the firm invests to create them. References Archor, S. (2011). â€Å"The Happiness Dividend†. Retrieved from http://blogs. hbr. org/cs/2011/06/the_happiness_dividend. html Bible – King James Version (1997). Proverbs 22:6. Hendrickson Publishers: Peabody. MA. Manjool, F. (2013). â€Å"Here’s How Google Became Such A Great Place To Work. Retrieved from http://www. huffingtonpost. com/2013/01/22/working-at-google_n_2526889. html Tarwater, M. (2012). â€Å"Employee Satisfaction†. Retrieved from www. carolinashealthcare. org Wilner, J. (2011). â€Å"5 Ways Positive Psychology can Improve the Workplace†. Retrieved from http://blogs. psychcentral. com/positive-psychology/2011/11/5-ways-positive-psychology-can-improve-the-workplace/ How to cite Positive Psychology in the Workplace, Papers

Speech Enhancement Techniques and Their Comparison free essay sample

The implementation of the code is done using Graphic User Interface on MATLAB. Keywords— Speech enhancement, FFT, Spectral subtraction, Kalman filter, Wiener filter, Performance parameters I. INTRODUCTION Speech is the fundamental and common medium, hence important for us, to communicate. In general, there exists a need for voice based communications,human-machine/machine-machine interfaces, and automatic speech recognition systems to increase the reliability of these systems in noisy environments. In many cases, these systems work well in nearly noise-free conditions, but their performance deteriorates rapidly in noisy conditions. Therefore, improvement in existing pre-processing algorithms or introducing entire new class of algorithm for speech enhancement is always the objective of research community. In speech enhancement, the goal is to improve the quality of degraded speech. Speech enhancement algorithms are noise suppression techniques, using the knowledge from the field of hearing science, that mitigate the effect of the corrupting background noise, and hence improve the perceived speech quality and speech intelligibility. Enhancing of speech degraded by noise is used for many applications such as mobile phones, VoIP, teleconferencing systems, speech recognition, and hearing aids. The problem of improving performance of speech communication systems in noisy environments has been a challenging area for research for more than three decades now. Efforts to achieve higher quality and/or intelligibility of noisy speech may effectively end up improving performance of other speech applications such as speech coding/compression and speech recognition etc. given in [1][2][3][4][5]. Speech enhancement has three major goals: . To improve the quality and intelligibility of speech corrupted by background noise, reduce the perceptual fatigue. 2. To make speech coders robust when to input noise. 3. To make speech recognition systems more robust to noise. This project presents an overview of different speech enhancement methods and provides a review of some of the major aspects and approaches in this category. II. BAS IC BLOCK DIAGRAM The basic block diagram for speech enhancement is as shown below in Fig. 1. Fig. 1 Basic Block Diagram The noisy input signal is sent through the analysis window. Here, a few samples of the signal are selected at a time as the signal is continuous and big and cannot be processed in one go. Fast Fourier Transform is applied to convert the signal from time domain to frequency domain. The magnitude of noise and noisy speech are compared and noise is subtracted from the affected speech. The enhanced speech received is in frequency domain and hence requires to be converted back to frequency domain. This is done by taking Inverse Fourier Transform. Overlap and add method is applied to the recovered enhanced signal so as to compensate for the windowing method applied in the beginning. In our project, since the signal applied at input has few samples, windowing method is not implemented. III. DESCRIPTION A. SPECTRAL SUBTRACTION METHOD The Spectral Subtraction method is the most widely used due to the simplicity of implementation and also due to low computational load. As studied in [5] [6], Spectral subtraction is a method for restoration of the power spectrum or the magnitude spectrum of a signal observed in additive noise, through subtraction of an estimate of the average noise spectrum from the noisy signal spectrum. It reduces the effect of background noise based on the STSA estimation technique. The basic power spectral subtraction technique is popular due to its simple underlying concept and its effectiveness in enhancing speech degraded by additive noise. The basic principle of the spectral subtraction method is to subtract the magnitude spectrum of noise from that of the noisy Speech. The noise spectrum can be estimated, and updated, during the periods when the signal is absent or when only noise is present. The noise is assumed to be uncorrelated and additive to the Speech signal. An estimate of the noise signal is measured during silence or non-Speech activity in the signal. The phase of the noisy Speech is kept unchanged, since it is assumed that the phase distortion is not perceived by human ear. However the subtraction type algorithms have a serious drawback in that the enhanced Speech is accompanied by unpleasant musical noise artifact, which is characterized by tones with random frequencies. The simple subtraction processing comes with a price. The subtraction process needs to be done carefully to avoid any Speech distortion. If too much is subtracted, then some Speech information might be removed as well, while if too little is subtracted then much of the interfering noise remains. The block diagram given in [7] is as shown in Fig. 2. Fig. 2 SPECTRAL SUBTRACTION Noisy Speech is given as an input to this filter. Windowing is done in order to take fixed number samples of the signal which is continuous in nature. Inthis method only the magnitude is considered. The phase part is not taken into consideration as it increases the complexity and calculations. Fourier transform is applied to the signal in order to convert the signal from timedomain to frequency domain. This helps us to obtain magnitude and phase as separate values. The magnitude of estimated noise is subtracted from themagnitude of noisy signal and an enhanced Speech is obtained at the output of spectral modification block. Inverse Fourier transform of the enhanced speech is taken so as to obtain the signal in its time domain form. Phase ofsignal, in its original form, is added to the magnitude at this stage. Thus weobtain an enhanced version of the noisy Speech signal at the output end. B. WEINER FILTER Speech processing has been a growing and dynamic field for more than two decades and there is every indication that this growth will continue and even accelerate. A useful approach to filter optimization problem is to minimize the mean squared value of the error signal that is defined as the differencebetween some desired response and the actual filter output. There are workslikes [13][14], which describes Weiner filters as class of optimum linear filterswhich involve linear estimation of a desired signal sequence from anotherrelated sequence. This technique is widely used in the field of signal processing. Weiner filter is a common and adaptive filter technique and is the solution for stationary input signals. The filter has its origin in Kalmans document (1960) where it is describedas a recursive solution for the linear filtering problem for discrete data. Theresearch was in a wide context of state-space models, where the point is the estimation through the recursive least squares. The goal of the Wiener filter is to filter out noise that has corrupted a signal. It is based on a statisticalapproach. Typical filters are designed for a desired frequency response. However, the design of wiener filter takes a different approach. One is assumedto have knowledge of the spectral properties of the original signal and thenoise, nd one seeks the linear time invariant filter whose output would comeas close to the original signal as possible. Fig. 3 WEINER FILTER Shown above in Fig. 3, is the block diagram of Weiner filter. In this process, mean of all the samples is calculated. Deviation of each sample from the mean is found and the summation is represented as Pd(w). Mean of noise power is represent ed as Py(w). Py(w) is subtracted from Pd(w) and the transfer function is calculated as shown. Thus we get enhanced speech signal at the output of the filter. C. MINIMUM MEAN SQUARE ERROR Given that some a priori knowledge of the radar SNR is available, a minimum mean-squared error estimator can be implemented. This estimator is the discrete implementation of a Wiener filter and minimizes the estimate error due to both noise and clutter. In other words if the matched filter maximizes signal to noise, and the ML estimator maximizes signal to clutter, the MMSE estimator can be said to maximize signal to interference, where interference is defined as the summation of both clutter and noise energy. Accordingly, this estimator provides SAR images superior to both correlation and ML processing for all SNR. As presented in [9], the STSA estimation problem formulated here is that of estimating the modulus of each complex Fourier expansion coefficient of the Speech signal in a given analysis frame from the noisy Speech in that frame. This formulation is motivated by the fact that the Fourier expansion coefficients of a given signal segment are samples of its Fourier transform, and by the close relation between the Fourier series expansion and the discrete Fourier transform is given in [10][11]. The latter relation enables an efficient implementation of the resulting algorithm by utilizing the FFT algorithm. The basic formula for power spectral density of MMSE filter as given in [8] is: E|Xk|2Y? k=? k1+? k? dk+(? 1+? kYk)2 Where,? k is the a priori SNR. The basic block diagram of MMSE filter is shown in Fig. 4 Fig. 4 MMSE Filter To derive the MMSE STSA estimator, the a priori probability distribution of the Speech and noise Fourier expansion coefficients should be known. Since in practice they are unknown, one can think of measuring each probability distribution or, alternatively, assume a reasonable statistical model. In the discussed problem, the Speech and possibly also the noise are neither stationary nor Ergodic processes. This fact excludes the convenient possibility of obtaining the above probability distributions by examining the long-time behavior of each process. Hence, the only way which can be used is to examine independent sample functions belonging to the ensemble of each process, e. g. , for the Speech process these sample functions can be obtained from different speakers. However, since the probability distributions we are dealing with are time-varying (due to non-stationary nature of processes), their measurement and characterization by the above way is complicated, and the entire procedure seems to be impracticable. The only disadvantage of the MMSE processor as explained in [12] is the huge additional complexity in determining the linear estimator. Additionally, for large problems, the matrix inverse operation required to implement the MMSE estimator is very problematic. Especially in the field of radar signal processing computing the inverse of the large matrices can really slow down the processing speed. An iterative implementation of the MMSE algorithm can be developed where the data vector is split into smaller segments to reduce processing time. D. KALMAN FILTER Described in works of[16][17], Kalman filter (KF) algorithm, an iterative implementation of the MMSE estimator is proposed, developed, analysed andoptimized. It has been shown that the processing speed can be decreased, bybreaking the data vector into an optimal number of segments. Kalman filtering is known as an effective Speech Enhancement technique, in which Speechsignal is usually modelled as autoregressive (AR) process and represented inthe state-space domain. In the above context, all the Kalman filter-basedapproaches proposed in the past operate in two steps. They first estimatethe noise and the driving variances and parameters of the signal model, thenestimate the Speech signal. It uses a systems dynamic model (i. e. , physical laws of motion), knowncontrol inputs to that system, and measurements (such as from sensors) toform an estimate of the systems varying quantities that is better than theestimate obtained by using any one measurement alone. As such, it is acommon sensor fusion algorithm. The Kalman filter averages a predictionof a systems state with a new measurement using a weighted average. Thepurpose of the weights is that values with better estimated uncertainty are trusted more. The weights are calculated from the covariance, a measureof the estimated uncertainty of the prediction of the systems state. The result of the weighted average is a new state estimate that lies in between the predicted and measured state, and has a better estimated uncertainty than either alone. This process is repeated every time step, with new estimate and its covariance informing the prediction used in the following iteration. This means that the Kalman filter works recursively and requires only thelast best guess and not the entire history of a systems state to calculate a newstate. When performing actual calculations for the filter, the state estimateand covariance are coded into matrices to handle the multiple dimensions involved in a single set of calculations. This allows for representation of linearrelationship between different state variables such as position, velocity, andacceleration in any of the transition models or covariance. The use of Kalmanfilter for Speech Enhancement was first introduced by Paliwal (1987). Thismethod however is best suitable for reduction of white noise to comply withKalman assumption. In deriving Kalman equations it is normally assumed that the process noiseis uncorrelated and has a normal distribution. This assumption leads towhiteness character of this noise. It is assumed that Speech signal is stationary during each frame that is the AR model of Speech remains the sameacross the segment. Kalman filter is an adaptive least square error filterthat provides an efficient computational recursive solution for estimating asignal in presence of Gaussian noises. Kalman filter theory is based on astate-space approach in which a state equation odels the dynamics of thesignal generation process and an observation equation models the noisy anddistorted observation signal. The advantages of Kalman Filtering Technique [18] are: It avoids the influence of possible structural changes on the result. The recursive estimationstarts from an initial sample and updates the estimations by adding a newobservation until the end of the data. This implies that the most recent coefficients estimation is affected by the distant history; in presence of structuralchanges the data series can be cut. This cut can be corrected through thesequential estimations but with the biggest standard error. Like this, theKalman filter, like other recursive methods, uses all the series history butwith one advantage: It tries to estimate a stochastic path of the coefficientsinstead of a deterministic one. In this way it solves the possible estimationcut when structural changes happen. This filter is in equal terms with Gauss-Markov theorem and this gives to Kalman filter its enormous power to solvea wide range of problems on statistic inference. The filter is distinguishedby its skill to predict the state of a model in the past, present and future,although the exact nature of the modelled system is unknown. The dynamicmodelling of a system is one of the key features which distinguish the Kalmanmethod. The disadvantages of Kalman Filtering Technique are: That it is necessary toknow the initial conditions of the mean and variance state vector to start therecursive algorithm. There is no general consent over the way of determiningthe initial conditions. Fig. 5 As shown in Fig. 5, the input Speech signal is taken and distortion of noise isin the signal is found. The current output is based on the past output andcurrent input which is solved using Yules equation. All the parameters are represented in the form of state space matrix because it makes calculationseasier. Next filter gain is calculated and noise is then removed from the noisySpeech input to get enhanced Speech signal. IV. MEASURES OF PERFORMANCE PARAMETERS A. SIGNAL-TO-NOISE RATIO (SNR) Signal-to-noise ratio (often abbreviated as SNR or S/N) is a measure used in science and engineering that compares the level of a desired signal to the level ofbackground noise. Signal-to-noise ratio is sometimes used informally to refer to the ratio of usefulinformation to false or irrelevant data in a conversation or exchange. Signal-to-noise ratio is defined as the power ratio between a signal (meaningful information)and the background noise (unwanted signal). It is measured in dBs SNR=10? log10mean(Input2)mean(Input2-Enhanced2) B. MEAN SQUARE ERROR (MSE) In statistics, the Mean Squared Error (MSE) of an estimator is one of many waysto quantify the difference between values implied by an estimator and the truevalues of the quantity being estimated. MSE is a risk function, corresponding tothe expected value of the squared error loss or quadratic loss. MSE measures theaverage of the squares of the errors. The error is the amount by which the valueimplied by the estimator differs from the quantity to be estimated. The differenceoccurs because of randomness or because the estimator doesnt account for information that could produce a more accurate estimate. MSE=1length(Input)? (Enhanced-Input)2 C. NORMALIZED ROOT MEAN SQUARE ERROR (NRMSE) The Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) also known as Root-Mean-Square Deviati on(RMSD) is a frequently used measure of the differences between values predictedby a model or an estimator and the values actually observed. These individualdifferences are called residuals when the calculations are performed over the datasample that was used for estimation, and are called prediction errors when computed out-of-sample. The RMSE serves to aggregate the magnitudes of the errors in predictions for various times into a single measure of predictive power. RMSE is a good measure of accuracy, but only to compare forecasting errors of different models for a particular variable and not between variables, as it is scale-dependent. NRMSE=mean[(Input-Enhanced)2]mean{[Input-mean(Input)]2} D. PEAK SIGNAL-TO-NOISE RATIO(PSNR) Peak Signal-to-Noise Ratio, often abbreviated PSNR, is an engineering term forthe ratio between the maximum possible power of a signal and the power of corrupting noise that affects the fidelity of its representation. Because many signalshave a very wide dynamic range, PSNR is usually expressed in terms of the logarithmic decibel scale. PSNR is most commonly used to measure the quality of reconstruction of lossy compression codecs (e. g. , for image compression). The signal in this case is the original data, and the noise is the error introduced by compression. When comparing compression codecs, PSNR is an approximation to human perception of reconstruction quality. Although a higher PSNR generally indicates that the reconstruction is of higher quality, in some cases the reverse may be true. PSNR=10? log10length? max? [Input2]Input2-Enhanced2 E. DISTORTION(AAD) Distortion (or warping) is the alteration of the original shape (or other characteristic) of something, such as an object, image, sound or waveform. Distortion isusually unwanted, and often efforts are to lessen it. The addition of noise or otheroutside signals (hum, interference) is not deemed distortion, though the effects ofquantization distortion are sometimes deemed noise. In this project we use theparameter AAD to measure the distortion in the given Speech signal. AAD=1lengthInput? (Enhanced-Input) V. APPLICATIONS AND FUTURE SCOPE * Cell phone speech enhancement * Pay phones in a noisy environment * Air-ground communication systems * Teleconferencing systems * Hearing aids VI. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS The above mentioned techniques of speech enhancement were applied to the noisy speech input and the performance parameters were evaluated as below. Fig. 6 Clean Speech Fig. 7 Noisy Speech Fig. 8 Spectral Subtraction Output Fig. 9Weiner Filter Output Fig. 10MMSE Filter Output Fig. 11 Kalman Filter Output VII. CONCLUSION The technique most suitable for speech enhancement is the one which provides robustness to environmental factors, robustness to acoustical inputs. Table 1. Parameters In this project, we havereviewed the methodologies and principles of various techniques and presented the analysis in GUI MATLAB Based on theperformance parameters the following points have been concluded: (a) Wiener Filter follows statistical approach and could be tuned to provideoptimal performance b) Kalman has the ability to estimate accurately by using autoregressive(AR)modeling and is suitable for real-time applications. (c) Spectral Subtraction is a real time filter which is relatively easy toimplement for stationary noise. (d) MMSE provides best values for the most parameters under given conditionsand hence is most suitable technique for spee ch enhancement Agraphical representation for comparison of the above mentioned techniques is as below: A. SNR Fig 12. SNR Comparison The above graph provides a comparison between input SNR for each technique and their respective output SNR. The signal to noise ratio for MMSE is more than all filters for any value of input SNR whereas that of Spectral subtraction is the least for all inputs SNR. B. PSNR Fig 13. PSNR Comparison The graph given shows the value of peak Signal-to-noise ratio for all speech enhancement techniques. The value of PSNR is greatest for Wiener filter for all input SNR. C. MSE Fig 13. MSE Comaprison The graph gives the comparison of all four speech enhancement methods for mean square error. At input SNR=2DB,error reduced is the most in MMSE. Kalman filter works most efficiently at SNR input=5DB. Noise suppression is least in wiener filter for the given conditions. VIII. REFERENCES [1] Speech Signal Processing by School of Electronic Information,Wuhan University. [2] Recent Advancements in Speech Enhancement by Yariv Ephraimand Israel Cohen, March 9, 2004. [3] Speech Enhancement using Adaptive Filters by T. Lalith Kumarand Soudara Rajan. [4] http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki [5] Overview of Speech Enhancement Techniques for Automatic Speaker recognition by Javier Ortega-Garca and Joaqun Gonzlez-Rodrguez [6] Advanced Digital Signal Processing and Noise Reduction, SecondEdition by Saeed V. Vaseghi. 7] Transform Based Speech Enhancement Techniques by Soon IngYann. [8] Speech Enhancement using a Laplacian based MMSE estimator of the magnitude spectrum byDr. Bin Chen. [9] Linear Prediction Algorithms by Mohit Garg, IIT-B. [10] Speech Enhancement Using a Minimum Mean Square Error Short Time Spectral Amplitude Estimator by Yaric Ebrahim. [11] A Laplacian based MMSE estimator for Speech Enhancement by Bin Chen, Philipos C. Loizou. [12] Minimum Mean Square Error Filtering:Autocorrelation/Covariance, General Delays and Multirate Systems by Peter Kabal. [13] Improve Speech Enhancement using Weiner Filtering by S. China, Venkateswarlu, Dr. K. Satya Prasad, Dr. A. SubbaRami Reddy. [14] Performance Analysis of Multichannel Wiener amp; Filter-BasedNoise Reduction in Hearing Aids under Second Order Statistics Estimation Errors by Bram Cornelis, Marc Moonen and JanWouters. [15] A Wiener Filtering Ian V. Oppenheim and George C. Verghese,2010. [16] Dual channel Speech Enhancement using Hadamard LMS algorithm with DCT preprocessing technique by D. Deepa. [17] An improved SNR estimator for Speech Enhancement by Yao Ren and Michael T. Johnson. [18] http://www. mathworks. com/support

Abortion Act Essays - Sexual Revolution, Abortion, Fertility

Abortion Act What is meant by abortion? Abortion is defined in the dictionary as, "The expulsion of a foetus (naturally or by medical induction) from the womb before it is able to survive independently (around 28 weeks)." This simply means the foetus is removed by either a natural or medical procedure before the time of the natural birth would have occurred, before the foetus could support it's own life. Their are in fact three types of abortion. They are: Voluntary - when the mother decides to have an abortion out of choice, Therapeutic - carried out when the mother's health is in danger and Spontaneous - when the foetus dies during the pregnancy (the same as a miscarriage). The Abortion Act is what is used to determine whether an abortion is justified, it was passed in 1967 and then amended in 1990. Currently it states that: 1967 Abortion Act An abortion may be performed legally if two or more doctors certify that: 1. The mental and physical health of the woman, or her existing children, will suffer if the pregnancy continues. Or.... 2. The child, if born, would be seriously physically or mentally handicapped. 1990 amendment As the 1967 Act, except that the time limit for when an abortion can be carried out was reduced to 24 weeks. This Act means a pregnant woman has the right to an abortion if: 1. Upon keeping the pregnancy, and therefore having the child, the mother and/or any children she already has would be harming their physical or mental well being. 2. The foetus has been shown to have either a physical or mental disability and therefore would be born handicapped. If two doctors both agree that the woman suffers from either of the points, then abortion is a legal option, as long as the pregnancy has not gone more than 24 weeks after conception. A 15 yr. old girl is pregnant and has requested and abortion without her parents knowing and with no intention to do so. The girl would be allowed an abortion even though she is too young (under 16) to give consent for the medical procedure to take place. The grounds the girl would be allowed the abortion under would be under the first section of the 1967 Act, the pregnancy if continued, would pose a risk to the mother's own mental health. An amniocentesis test shows that the baby has a serious deformity. There is no doubt that an abortion would be legal in this circumstance, it falls exactly under the second section of the 1967 Act, because the baby, if born, would be either seriously physically or mentally handicapped. The pregnancy was a result of rape. An abortion would be permitted to the mother, because keeping the pregnancy would cause the mother's mental health to suffer, this the first section of the 1967 Act. The Abortion Act allows for most abortions to go ahead, as it is open to various interpretations (especially in the first section). One scenario where an abortion would not be permitted would be: A scan has shown that the baby is female and the parents want a boy. These would not be significant grounds for an abortion to be said to be legal. However it could be argued that it would cause the mother mental distress, but it is does not really pose a serious threat to her health. However there has been a case of a mother who had two abortions on the NHS because she didn't like the looks of either of the fathers.

buy custom Legalization of Recreational Marijuana and The Utilitarianism Theory

buy custom Legalization of Recreational Marijuana and The Utilitarianism Theory Legalization of Recreational Marijuana Introduction In this paper, I will consider whether the recreational use of marijuana is morally justified from the perspective of the utilitarianism theory. Due to the growing public concern over the scandal issue of marijuana legalization, it remains a highly uncertain issue seeking final and firm answer like the one what was the first to come, a hen or an egg. Marijuana legalization is primarily justified by utilitarianism theory that proved to be efficient and supports most of the aspects of cannabis legalization. However, this theory cannot provide strong and persuading evidence to the full extent to convince the passionate challengers of legal cannabis and leave them no chance to be able to find more counterarguments to marijuana usage and legalization. Although the base point of utilitarianism if applied to making marijuana legal provides strong support for the marijuana users, still in some perspectives they may be interpreted as be vague and doubtful, encountering various objections.

Clarifying your goals Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Clarifying your goals - Essay Example Wisdom and knowledge will help me to make suitable decisions in my personal and professional context. Knowledge and wisdom will ensure my contribution towards my profession significantly (Por & Molloy, 2000). In order to enhance my wisdom and knowledge level, I am required to identify a rational objective of my goal. In this regard, the milestones for achieving my objectives will be time management and innovation. The milestones will aid in developing my creativity skills to develop and enhance my personal as well as professional knowledge base (Por & Molloy, 2000). I will need around four months to enhance my wisdom and knowledge level. During this four months period, I will learn more about the changing technologies of modern era, which will ensure my efficiency level by possessing adequate knowledge about the modern technologies used in different business operations. In a similar manner, the time management skill will assist in building my creativeness. I am required to look for a mentor, who will assists me in developing my competencies for accomplishing mu objectives effectively. Moreover, I have developed an action plan in order to ensure that I accomplish my goal successfully (Por & Molloy, 2000). I have identified that to ensure my goal, I will require a mentor to teach me the techniques based on which I will be able to accomplish my objectives successfully, so that I become competent for my MBA program and professional life. Accordingly, I have developed a time line, which will aid me in accomplishing my desired objectives and goal within stipulated

Statement of purpose 6 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Statement of purpose 6 - Essay Example My father is a Mathematics teacher in an intermediate school in Kuwait while my mother is a Kindergarten teacher. They both loved to assist their students in making their dreams come true and they are not about to stop in giving their all to help me reach mine. Having big dreams is one of the things they have always encouraged us, motivating us to excel in various activities and not just concentrate in one thing because they believe that we can never find what is best for us if we do not try other things. My parents have truly been my greatest motivating factors even now, encouraging me to finish my postgraduate studies while they are still able to financially support me. Enrolling for the Masters degree is one of my greatest dreams and I am glad that I have great support which I am taking while I am still young and single so I decided to widen my knowledge in the teaching profession by enrolling in your excellent university. It is my strong desire to become the best teacher I could be, working at a university, shaping the minds of future professionals and encouraging them to become the best that they could be as well. Working as an English teacher in the Ministry of Education in Kuwait since the last quarter of 2010 made me realize how great are the information and trainings that I still need to have. I do believe that I can learn a lot as I go along with my teaching profession, through experience. Nevertheless, as I mentioned earlier, I want to grab the chance to accumulate all the education I can have while I am still young and able to grasp much information and while there are able people to support me. I have graduated English Language and Literature in Arts College, majoring in Linguistics with minor in Translations at Kuwait University and as far as my professors are concerned, they have given me good reviews saying I have a good level of English fluency both in oral and written form. Having English as my second language, I like to have the fluency of na tive speaker so that the United Kingdom has been on the top of my list not just because of the geographical advantage it gives me but because of my love for the historical places. Enrolling in the country will give me a great advantage in my speech especially the correct pronunciation of words as well as sentence construction and other important things to consider in the employment of the language. Though my professors have highly approved of my present skills, I know there is still a wide room for my improvement and I am looking forward to fill that void in the United Kingdom, in the University of Warwick. One of my great passions is teaching but as they say, you can only give what you have. In my few months of working with the Ministry of Education, I have to confess that my educational experience is still not enough to get me through to be the teacher I would like to be. Ambitious, you might think I am. Probably, I would much agree but not in the negative sense of the word becaus e my ambitions are not just geared to the making of a great ‘me’ but to becoming the vessel of information and training where students could take the training and education they want from me. I have seen how much my fellow Kuwaitis need the training from a foreign land and I am offering myself to be just another instrument to meeting this need. It is my desire that I would be a great influence in the success of other people as I succeed in my own

Rights of Homeless People and the Balance Between Individual Rights Essay

Rights of Homeless People and the Balance Between Individual Rights and a Community's Responsibility - Essay Example Many people think that homeless people are those that don’t have home or shelter alone and are living on the street but actually we can also categorized those that cannot avail safety and security, health services and the basic needs of human beings. Not all panhandlers on the streets are considered homeless people. Some of them have their own houses but they cannot provide themselves with food, clothes, safe and secure shelter. Other rights of homeless people are protection against bad weather and personal security for example health insurances so that just in case they met an accident they are very sure that they will be treated. One of the countries that provide health insurance to poor people catered by their government is Korea. Poor people are provided with health insurance. In other countries, if people wanted to avail of health insurance in the future, then they have to pay some amount of money in advance. Other rights of homeless people in my opinion are education and work. In the Philippines, in a government school, the government provides for the education of the students especially in the elementary level. Everything is free in elementary level. Unlike in Korea, in government schools, they have to pay large amount of money in order for the students to avail education. Work is also a very important right of homeless people. In order to stop panhandlers and to stop the increasing number of homeless people, they have the right to be given jobs that will sustain themselves and their family as well. The governments of many countries are in support of the rights of the homeless people but most of the supporters are private institutions and organizations. Basing from the essay written by Ascher â€Å"On Compassion†, from Anna Quindlen’s essay â€Å"Homelessness†, she talks about some ordinary citizens just like the mother who offered a dollar, and the French woman who gave the food. It’s not only our government or the ins titutions or organizations that have the responsibility of helping the homeless people but it also needs to start in us. We, the people who can see the situations of these homeless people, have the responsibilities to help them. There are also other individual rights and the community’s responsibility to its entire citizen especially to these homeless people that every person needs to know. First and foremost is the right to respect. Not all homeless people will be fully satisfied with the money given to them. Just like the example of Ascher’s in her essay wherein the woman is giving the money to the man but the man kept on staring at the baby and didn’t care to get the money. In return the responsibility of the community is also to treat others with respect and well behaved manner. If people want respect from other people, start within them first in order to attain that respect of other people. Another individual right is the right to respect the rights of othe rs to feel safe and secure. This is what other people missed. Other people often see homeless ones like they just need food and clothes but the most important one, they cannot provide. Even though they know the solution to provide housing for these homeless people, they are satisfied in just providing them food and clothes. It is our responsibility to help each other, we, citizens, the government and organizations to work together to help them. It is all our responsibilit

Benefits of the International Reporting Standards

Benefits of the International Reporting Standards 2. 0 Literature review 2.1 Introduction Literature abounds in polarising this subject matter the benefits of the international reporting standards. Looking back at the last quarter of the 20th century it will no longer be seen as an evolutionary period global financial market in a bit to introduce a single set of standards that will be generally acceptable in financial reporting. International reporting standards have revolutionized the domestic accounting system to a more capital oriented system (Hope et al, d Archy 2001). Lantto (2007) states that the information provided by the IFRS is more reliable and relevant. Darke and Deske (2006) highlights that the disclosure quality has increased tremendously since the adoption of the IFRS. Furthermore, Ding et al (2006) states that the adoption of the IFRS has made a great impact in bridging the differences in the use of the domestic standards among the countries. In justifying the theories, there are opinions as well as oppositions on the advantages of the international reporting standards. What becomes evident although arguably is that the movement from the domestic standard of reporting to the international standard of reporting is of great benefit to financial reporting to the shareholders, firms ,organizations and also global economy as it will place the whole countries in the same reporting field. This chapter will review this report from the historical background of the international financial reporting standards, the Implementation and enforcement then to the benefits of the adoption of this standard. 2.2 Financial Reporting. In the beginning financial reporting can hardly be called external (Alexander, Britton and Jorissen, 2003: 22) rather it was a way by which the owners were informed on their income and capital. This is because the owners and managers of the company were not separated. Until in the 1800s when they started encountering the agency problems it becomes evident to separate ownership (management) from capital supply. Then external wreporting was introduced in order to provide information outside the borders of a specific country. Hence, financial reporting emanates from internal to external reporting. Financial reporting provides information to the users for making economic decisions (Iqbal 2002). Gilmore and Wilmot (1992) states that reporting has developed over time in a bid to stress the need for investment decision making and also to attract investors into the company. Hegarty (1997) opines that the range and varieties of this reporting regime is as a result of an evolution which shows the uniqueness in the economic, cultural and legal jurisdiction. As a part of the revolutionary process financial reporting has changed over time (Crowther 2000). The change is a result of a need for a good financial reporting system that will communicate real value an d risk to the users of the reports (Damant 2000) .Hence, the quality of a financial report is dependent on the reporting standards. 2.3 Why Standards? According to (Perks 1994,p.137),Accounting standards may be seen as the professions rules, which supplement companies Act requirements that are intended to restrict directors freedom of manovoevre and to ensure that the financial statements are presented on a more comparable, consistent and standard basis. Perks (1994) reporting standards is also important in order to prevent scandals, abuses, financial collapsing in the companies and creative accounting that may jeopardize the profession. Also, Elliot and Elliot (2008) highlight some reasons for standard this includes: Comparability: Financial statements should be able to allow users make predictions on future cash flows and also evaluate managements performance. Credibility: For financial information to disclose information that will give a true and fair view, uniformity is therefore essential. Influence: To be able to stimulate a development of the conceptual framework the process at which the standards are formulated should be able to give a constructive appraisal of the policies proposed for the individual financial reporting. Discipline: A mandatory standard is necessary as it structures a regulation that will be systematic and ongoing thereby enforcing a disciple in the financial markets for all organizations listed in the stock exchange. The usefulness of a reporting standard cannot be overemphasized although there are some arguments on this. Harvey and Keer (1983) argued that information produced using financial standards could be unreliable at times and the standards might be bureaucratic and inflexible. Also, there may be adverse allocative effects . Consequently, there might be consensus-seeking and standard overload . Lets take an illustration of a of two companies; Enron and Ahold to further explain why we need standards. Enron is the seventh largest US based company falling into bankruptcy as a result of an overstated profit of $500 million and the Ahold the third largest US grocer had their earnings overstated for the past two years by $500. 2.3 How National differences affects reporting. Given that the environment differ from country to country, the types of decisions to be taken and information needed in decision making differs from one country to another. Hence, accounting system is environment specific. (Iqbal 2002). Adhikari and Tondkar (1992) reported that financial accounting reporting and disclosure standards and practices do not develop in a vacuum but reflect the particular environment in which they are developed (p. 76). The culture of a country affects its method of accounting and financial reporting. For example, Gary (1988) in his books illustrated one of the ways by which cultural differences affects countries financial reporting; a country with a high uncertainty avoidance and low individualism will tend to be more conservative in their income measurement than in a country with low certainty avoidance and high individualism. Although the measures of cultural attributes may be indistinct and not direct in financial reporting compared with the other factors that affect financial reporting.Also, the nature of accounting regulations in a country is influenced by the general system of law applicable in that country. For example Jaggi and Low (2000), notes that companies in the common laws countries tends to have a high level of disclosures than countries in a codified Roman law system. La Porta et al. (1998) argues that common countries have investors with a strong legal protection than the Roman law countries do. Moreover, the differences in the types of business organization and ownership also affect financial reporting. Elliot and Elliot (2008) further explains this stating that in a country like the UK the business structure indicates a separation of the ownership and the management while in the French business the structure differentiates the ownership from the managers.. According to Nobes and Parker (1 998, p.21):The difference in the providers of finance (creditors/insiders) versus (equity/ outsiders) is the key cause of international differences in financial reporting. Although there is an increasing scale, companies firms had to find extra capital to finance growth. (Alexander, Britton and Jorrisen 2003). Roe (2003), further argues that political differences are the major cause of the differences in corporate structures in the developed western countries. Also the accountancy profession is another determinant of the differences in financial reporting. Nobes and Parker (2006:36) emphasizes that the strength, size, and competence of the accountancy profession in a country affect the type of financial reporting that will be obtained in that country. So with these differences the financial analyst cannot be able to make a headway there is therefore a need for a uniform reporting standards. 2.4 Why the call for international reporting standards Over the years it becomes apparent for an ever increasing worldwide competition. The globalization of the markets and companies increased as a result of the cross-border securities market listings and capital raising.. Thus, there was no cross-border investments, investors therefore prefer to invest in companies whereby there will are more comfortable with their system of accounting . 2.5 Background of the International Reporting Standards. Financial reporting standards for international applicability became prevalent in the 1970s. International Accounting Standards committee (IASC) was set up in the 1973 in order to standardize the reporting differences in international investment communities. The establishment of the International Accounting Standard committee is seen as a response to the call by the accounting profession for a greater co-ordination of accounting rules among the various nations of the world (Kraayenhof 1960).The need was expressed in the international congresses of Accountants held in September, 1972 in Sydney. Chetkovich (1979, p.13) emphasizes that at each of these congresses, there was a demand for a better communications and closer cooperation among accountants on a worldwide basis; and also for greater harmonization of accounting standards. This statement led to the establishment of the IASC on June 29, 1973. The objectives of IASC are: to formulate and publish in the public interest, international standards; also to promote their acceptance and observance world-wide, and to work generally for the improvement and harmonisation of regulations, accounting standards and procedures relating to the presentation of financial statements. (IASC, 1983, Preface to Statements of International Accounting Standards, p.1). This is the first step towards the achievement of a globally recognised standard .The members of the IASC accept that adopting of international accounting standards (IAS) will improve the quality of financial statements (IASC ,1995). How far did this go or were there criticisms to this standard? IASC helped in solving the problem of uniformity although the purpose of it enactment was far from being realised. One of the weaknesses is that the standard issued by IASC has many objectives thereby making it difficult to achieve the purpose of consistency in recognition, measurement and presentation of transactions (IASB section 4). The standard is also too broad and allowed the use of several alternative accounting treatments. Atiken and Wise (1984) emphasizes that the IASC gives more attention to the multinational companies and investors in the multinational businesses more than it emphasizes on the harmonization of all spheres of the organization globally. Therefore emphasizing that IAS C was set up for the harmonization of accounting on a worldwide basis in order to improve the financial reporting and decision-making capability of multinational businesses, and investors in multinational businesses.(p.176). The second criticism to the use of IASC is that of the mandate. The statement starts with the phrase to formulate and publish in the public interest international standards†¦. (IASC). Hence they act in the interest of the public by a way of enforcing the rules which may not be favourable to the public. This absence of democratic legitimacy has been the major reason by which the IASC standards have not been enforced. Besides , this the structure and the membership composition of the IASC lacked the requirements needed for a global standard setting organization which includes the independence of its members, technical expertise and the decision making bodies representatives. McKinnon and Janelle (1983, p.33) argued that IASC has only succeeded in codifying generally accepted practice, in serving as a neutral source of standards ,and in influencing groups with the enforcement powers. Consequently, the IASC was restructured from the year 1998 to 2000 to International Accounting Standards Board (IASB). IASB is an independent London-based standard accounting body privately funded. The first IFRS was issued in the year 2003 with a membership of 19 countries but it has tremendously grown to 70 countries now with the EU mandating that all listed companies should use the IFRS in their financial reporting effective from the year 2005 (EC,2002). IASB has two member bodies the standard setting board and the member board of trustees .The IASB establishment is allied to that of the international federation of Accountants worldwide (IFAC).. The International Accounting Standards Board is committed to developing, in the public interest, a single set of high quality, global accounting standards that require transparent and comparable information in general purpose financial statements in addition, the IASB co-operates with the national accounting standard-setters to achieve con vergence in accounting standards around the world. (IASB, 2002, p.1). IASB has taken corrective measures in removing the accounting alternatives thereby ensuring that firms give a report that will reflect a true position and economic performance of the firm. IASB also aims at promoting global consistency in application and enforcement. It has also met the requirement that the business which operates in multiple bodies have a uniform financial statement which will be understandable in the countries whereby they operate. 2.6 International Accounting Standard Board (IASB) versus FASB? Norwalk agreement in the year 2002 by the Financial accounting Standard Board (FASB) and the International Accounting Standards Board was signed by both bodies after the need for a high quality, consistent and a comparable information which will be applicable to both domestic and the cross border financial reporting was recognized. Jacob and Madu (2009, p.3) the cited that both FASB and the IASB has pledged to use their best efforts in making their existing financial reporting standards fully compatible as is practicable and to coordinate their future work programmes to ensure that once achieved compatibility is maintained. This was also confirmed in their meeting in October 2005 of the two bodies reaffirming their commitments to converge US GAAP to IFRS. In a Concept Release, the SEC(2000) notes, Establishing and maintaining high quality accounting standards are critical to the US approach to regulation of capital markets, which depends on providing high quality information to facilitate informed investment decisions. (Jacob and Madu 2009).SEC released a proposal on July 13 2007, which states that US should recognize financial statements prepared using the IFRS from the foreign private issuers without reconciling them back to GAAP [2].furthermore, SEC informs all the investors that IFRS is the only set of standards with a high quality accounting standards that is more informative, useful for preparing financial reports compared with the US GAAP. This recent move to IFRS suggest that ,IFRS is the only standard that is of high quality and globally recognized and also has a potential to improve comparability of the financial statements despite of the country whereby they are domiciled. Despite all these efforts to converge to IFRS some academic literature still opines this stating that there are still material differences between the IFRS and the US GAAP. More so, the information contained in reconciliation is evident in the investment decisions made by the US investors. for example ,Culter and Neidemeyer (2009) argues that the major challenge why US did not want to adopt the IFRS is that there are differences in regulation and the manner at which these rules are been interpreted. IFRS is principal based regulatory system; which means that the rules are already set. On the other hand US GAAP is ruled based, whereby a detailed guidelines and principles is already laid out. Delliot (2007) emphasized that the principle based rules focuses more on the objective not relying more on the detailed rules. Deming (2005,p.4) gives a conclusive report pointing out that IFRS has more of a common law approach, than the US GAAP which is more of a civil law approach Furthermore, in the number of standards, IFRS has forty nine sta ndards while and nineteen interpretations and this consist of an approximate of two hundred pages (Delliot 2009) while the US GAAP has twenty thousand page (Mitra 2009).Other notable differences are seen in the financial reporting using the US GAAP and the IFRS. This will be comprehensively reviewed in the subsequent chapter. 2.7 Implementation and Enforcement of Financial Reporting Standards The credibility of a standard relies on its smooth implementation by countries that adopts it. Enforcement is a difficult concept to quantify and measure (Nobes and Parker 2006). The enforcement process differs from one country to another. Even at the international level there is still no genuine enforcement process. Moreover, some accounting bodies set standards and leaves enforcement to other bodies while others do both. For example US Securities and Exchange Commission sets laws and enforces it while IASC, Accounting Standards board (ASB) sets and develops standards and do not have the power to enforce these standards For the set rule of IFRS to be achieved an enforcement body has to be set up with powers to enforce the standards (Lamfalussy, 2001; Committee of European Securities Regulators [CESR], 2003a). Nobes and Parker (2008) states that the most determining factor for a successful adoption of this standard as a global standard is in the approach taken by the financial regulating bodies in the countries that adopts it. Giner and Rees (2005), Brown and Tarca (2005 )and Ball(2006 ) affirms that the purpose of IFRS is to provide a high quality financial reporting which can only be achieved with vigorous enforcement by the regulatory bodies (Schipper 2005 and Ball et al. 2003.The enforcement has not been easy certain factor has affected the effective enforcement of the law. Some of them vary from the cost, regulators interest and whether the businesses or accountants really need them. Watts and Zimmerman (1986), opines that the value of regulation is an empirical question, more apprehensive of ho w the regulatory authorities can value the costs and benefits of regulation. For example in the EU countries the structure and the organization that is in charge of the oversight of the requirements in the financial reporting varies among the EU countries. Also some countries do not have institutional oversight of financial reporting (FEE, 2001a, p.10).The EU regulation therefore mandates that the member states are to take appropriate measures in order to ensure compliance with IFRS. (European Commission EC], 2002, n.16). As a result of this the need for a country to produce a multiple financial statements was eliminated. Lafferty (1981) noted that no enforcement mechanism ever existed in reality. Perks (1993), expressed in his opinion that, without a legal backing it is not easy for the reporting standards to be enforced. Enforcing of the accounting standards therefore may require statutory audit, an effective sanctions and monitoring by supervisory bodies and for it to be implemen ted. Thus, there will be continuous reformations and changes in these standards. IFRS AND EU The European Parliamentary on enacted a legislation 0n 14 March 2002 requiring all companies listed in the European stock exchange to publish their financial statements with in accordance with the International financial reporting standards. There is also an endorsement mechanism which ensures that IFRS meets the needs of the EU listed countries. 2.4 International Standardization, Harmonization and Uniformity. The move towards greater harmonization of professional accounting practices has been traced back 1904 and the first accounting congress in St Louis, Missouri (Samuels and Piper, 1985, p.59, Mueller, 1979, p.7). Samuels and Piper (1985 p.59) states that international issues were not important while Mueller (1979 p.7) states that there is a need to pay attention to International harmonization. Combarros (2000), also argues that there is a need for harmonization of the accounting. Harmonization and standardization are used synonymously by some authors (Tay and Parker, 1990). While other researchers has differentiated the two. Tay and Parker (1990, p.73) defined harmonization as a movement away from total diversity of practice and standardisation is seen as a process which involves a movement towards uniformity. Saudagaran (2001:32), futher emphasized that the rationale for harmonization is that it will enhance comparability of financial statements [therefore] making it easier to use acr oss countries While other proponents is of the school of thought that harmonization will is not be practicable or truly probable. Rudhede and Wahlberg (2003) emphasizes that the lack of accounting harmonization will give difficulties to the investors in understanding the accounting principles which varies among the countries. Walton. Moreover, harmonization is a way to put processes in place to be able to reduce the obstacles inherent in international comparability. Hulle (1993, p.73) stated that the objective of harmonization is the comparability of accounts. All the efforts of the EU towards harmonization of these accounting standards have been challenging and slow. 2.4.2 Merits of international harmonization. An argument in favour of international harmonization is, efficiency in trans-border transactions. (Walton, Haller, Raffournier, 1998, p.9). Although lack of uniformity in the reporting procedures and the comparability of the accounting information is another barrier to cross border investments. This comparability of the financial postions across national bodies is seen as one of the most important reason for harmonization (Cummins 1975). This will help to reduce lack of trust and non reliance on the financial statements. With this there will be a flow of international investment in the capital market. Turner (1983 p.58) in his studies affirms that the second advantage of harmonization is to consolidate divergent information when more than one set of report is required to comply with different national laws or practices; further stating that accounting diversity is the major cause why companies spend unnecessarily cost. According to Houston and Reinstein (2001), harmonization of the a ccounting standards will reduce the cost of business, more particularly across national borders, than it will contribute towards greater efficiency of the market regulations. Not only will that harmonization reduce the costs inherent in conducting financial statements analysis and investments in international context. Another advantage of international harmonization of the accounting standards is saving of resources (Muller 1961, Spacek 1971). Further arguments is that international harmonization of the accounting standards can advance capital market efficiency(Ramanna and Sletten 2009) while Ball et al., 2000; Ball Et al 2006 envisaged that if the international market does not go along with the associated capital market institutions can be expensive. Finally, harmonization of the international accounting standards will help in improving management decisions in the multinationals. (Hauworth 1973). 2.4.3 Demerits of international harmonization International harmonization if faced with some criticisms, Some of which are economic while others are political. One of the criticisms is that it cannot carter for a wide range of national circumstances, legal systems, stages of economic development, and cultural differences (Samuel and Piper, 1985, pp 100-109). Atiken and Islam refuted this stating that the nature of the economic transactions and the methods by which they are accounted for does not vary in essence. Walton, Haller, Raffournier, (1998) argued that harmonization distorts social balances that have not been tackled over a long period of time. In the readings of Blake and Hossain (1996) International harmonization of reporting standards especially IASC is less respectful of local particularities; in regards to this context options will be seen as to be bad ,methods are termed either good or bad and costly reconciliations is likely to be imposed. Kenny and Larson (1993) further argued that large professional organizations protect their selfish interest in the standard setting process. Also the absence of a strong professional accounting body is a major obstacle to harmonization of accounting standards. 2.10 Arguments for international reporting. The essence of international reporting standards is to give a universal reporting standard that will be comprehensive and transparent thereby improving investors confidence as well as also creating market integrity. (Hope et al., 2005; dArcy, 2001). In this section we looked at the benefits of international reporting standards to the investors, firms, and also to the global economy. Gordon (2008, p. 3) cited the speech of Levitt (1997) which stating that for international reporting standards to gain acceptance three key objectives must be in place: The standards should include a core set of accounting pronouncements that constitute a comprehensive, generally accepted basis of accounting. The standards must be of high quality – they must result in comparability and transparency and they must provide for full disclosure. The standards must be rigorously interpreted and applied. Financial Reporting quality and transparency under IFRS The question has been if the accounting figures reported under this standard will give of high quality compared to those under domestic standards?. Also will IFRS show transparency in disclosure for an informed decision for investment? Barth et al., (2007) states that this is an extremely intricate question to answer as the application of any given standard has exhibited the effects of the features of the financial reporting system, its standards, as well their interpretation, enforcement and litigation. As these affects the competence of the financial prepares and users. Tarca (2004) said that international accounting standards are one way of improving transparency in financial reporting. Ashbaugh and Pincus (2001) elaborate that since the adoption of IFRS there has been improvement in the forecast accuracy by the analyst. As a result of this analysts cost of information acquisition also reduces. Cuijpers and Buijink (2005) from his sample of firms domiciled in the European Union pr ovide evidence that the analyst following has increased. Also Barth et al (2003) and Barth et al (2007) reveal that higher value relevance for firms is higher since the adoption of the IFRS as compared with the pre adoption period. IFRS therefore reduces the estimation of risk in market returns. Hence we will say that the quality of the IFRS in financial reporting is therefore inestimable in countries that adopt IFRS than those that use the locally recognised standards. Although we have affirmed that IFRS is associated with a high accounting quality there may be oppositions to this. Firstly, where there is an intrinsic flexibility in the principles based standards; this may present opportunities for firms to manage their earning thereby reducing the accounting quality. Also, in a bit to limit the managerial discretion which relates to the accounting alternatives will also reduce the ability of the firm to report accounting measurements that will give a reflection of what the true po sition and economic performance of the company is. Thus, accounting regime affects the quality of the information thereby affecting the cost of capital. Cost of capital and IFRS Adoption There are various propositions on the whether the adoption of IFRS reduces liquidity and lower cost of capital. Before the adoption of IFRS investors have to spend some time and effort in translating the standards in a way they can to understand. This process wastes efforts time and incurs transaction cost. The cost of capital determines how risky an investment would be. The higher the cost of capital the more risky the investment will be. According to (Coffee 2002), findings on bonding theory there is a lowered cost of capital. Deske (2006) affirms that this associated reduction in information cost is the main benefits by which IFRS is being adopted. There will be a reduced cost since the same standard will be used by all countries not regarding where the countries are domiciled. Aras and Crowther (2008) argued that the reduction in the cost of information in the adoption of IFRS and an assured consequent reduction can only benefit the countries whose legal, cultural, and economic s ystem is the same with the nations which are involved in setting IFRS, hence other countries which are not beneficial to this may incur increased cost compliance. Although, Barth (2007); Marquez-Ramos (2008) emphasized that IFRS reduces information cost of an economy as capital flows and trade becomes globalised. Improved comparability of the accounting reports: The use of IFRS eliminates the lack of comparability of financial statements. Choi et al. 1999, p. 249 states that comparability eliminate the current misunderstandings of the investors on the reliability of foreign financial statements and this removes one of the most main impediments affecting the flow of international investment. It also makes it easier for companies to compare financial results of different reporting entities from different countries. Global recognition Globalization of the business activities has increased creating a need for comparability of financial information between firms of different countries .Most of the companies are going globalized therefore the use of national accounting rules is increasingly impairing effective communication both in internal and external reporting. In a recent study by the international federation of Accountants(IFAC) most accounting leaders all over the world has agreed that adopting IFRS will be vital for economic growth in their countries. It is also significant as it will make it easier to compare human capital needs of companys subsidiaries all over the world since professionals will be more mobile. IFRS improves profit figures: The movement from the domestically recognized standards to the internationally recognized standards has resulted to a tremendous increase in the net profit figures of top most countries financial reports although the balance sheets have deteriorated. It is noted already that IFRS requires a comprehensive reporting than the domestic standards. IFRS has determined the various accounting methods by which profit figures will be derived from and reported by the firms (Aras and Crowther 2008). Impact of IFRS on financial reporting Examining financial statement implications is important because, †¦ the only direct effects †¦ are changed financial statements †¦ (Hung and Subramanyan, 2004, p.4) Pijper (2009), further examines how IFRS has affected the reporting of financing on the balance sheet. In GAAP the put option were disclosed in a footnote as an off balance sheet figure, but with the IFRS the put options which is held by minorities are now treated as a financial liabilities. Prior to the adoption of IFRS most companies were very conservative in their depreciation rates and this was affecting the business profits in that some assets will still be in use and there is no report on the expense incurred against those assets in the income statements but now the IFRS has reduced the distortions b these excessive prudent nature of depreciation rates .From the studies of (Hung and Subramanyan 2004) IFRS emphasized that fair value should be used for balance sheet valuation. Barth et al (2005) from hi s studies discovered that companies that uses IFRS experienc Benefits of the International Reporting Standards Benefits of the International Reporting Standards 2. 0 Literature review 2.1 Introduction Literature abounds in polarising this subject matter the benefits of the international reporting standards. Looking back at the last quarter of the 20th century it will no longer be seen as an evolutionary period global financial market in a bit to introduce a single set of standards that will be generally acceptable in financial reporting. International reporting standards have revolutionized the domestic accounting system to a more capital oriented system (Hope et al, d Archy 2001). Lantto (2007) states that the information provided by the IFRS is more reliable and relevant. Darke and Deske (2006) highlights that the disclosure quality has increased tremendously since the adoption of the IFRS. Furthermore, Ding et al (2006) states that the adoption of the IFRS has made a great impact in bridging the differences in the use of the domestic standards among the countries. In justifying the theories, there are opinions as well as oppositions on the advantages of the international reporting standards. What becomes evident although arguably is that the movement from the domestic standard of reporting to the international standard of reporting is of great benefit to financial reporting to the shareholders, firms ,organizations and also global economy as it will place the whole countries in the same reporting field. This chapter will review this report from the historical background of the international financial reporting standards, the Implementation and enforcement then to the benefits of the adoption of this standard. 2.2 Financial Reporting. In the beginning financial reporting can hardly be called external (Alexander, Britton and Jorissen, 2003: 22) rather it was a way by which the owners were informed on their income and capital. This is because the owners and managers of the company were not separated. Until in the 1800s when they started encountering the agency problems it becomes evident to separate ownership (management) from capital supply. Then external wreporting was introduced in order to provide information outside the borders of a specific country. Hence, financial reporting emanates from internal to external reporting. Financial reporting provides information to the users for making economic decisions (Iqbal 2002). Gilmore and Wilmot (1992) states that reporting has developed over time in a bid to stress the need for investment decision making and also to attract investors into the company. Hegarty (1997) opines that the range and varieties of this reporting regime is as a result of an evolution which shows the uniqueness in the economic, cultural and legal jurisdiction. As a part of the revolutionary process financial reporting has changed over time (Crowther 2000). The change is a result of a need for a good financial reporting system that will communicate real value an d risk to the users of the reports (Damant 2000) .Hence, the quality of a financial report is dependent on the reporting standards. 2.3 Why Standards? According to (Perks 1994,p.137),Accounting standards may be seen as the professions rules, which supplement companies Act requirements that are intended to restrict directors freedom of manovoevre and to ensure that the financial statements are presented on a more comparable, consistent and standard basis. Perks (1994) reporting standards is also important in order to prevent scandals, abuses, financial collapsing in the companies and creative accounting that may jeopardize the profession. Also, Elliot and Elliot (2008) highlight some reasons for standard this includes: Comparability: Financial statements should be able to allow users make predictions on future cash flows and also evaluate managements performance. Credibility: For financial information to disclose information that will give a true and fair view, uniformity is therefore essential. Influence: To be able to stimulate a development of the conceptual framework the process at which the standards are formulated should be able to give a constructive appraisal of the policies proposed for the individual financial reporting. Discipline: A mandatory standard is necessary as it structures a regulation that will be systematic and ongoing thereby enforcing a disciple in the financial markets for all organizations listed in the stock exchange. The usefulness of a reporting standard cannot be overemphasized although there are some arguments on this. Harvey and Keer (1983) argued that information produced using financial standards could be unreliable at times and the standards might be bureaucratic and inflexible. Also, there may be adverse allocative effects . Consequently, there might be consensus-seeking and standard overload . Lets take an illustration of a of two companies; Enron and Ahold to further explain why we need standards. Enron is the seventh largest US based company falling into bankruptcy as a result of an overstated profit of $500 million and the Ahold the third largest US grocer had their earnings overstated for the past two years by $500. 2.3 How National differences affects reporting. Given that the environment differ from country to country, the types of decisions to be taken and information needed in decision making differs from one country to another. Hence, accounting system is environment specific. (Iqbal 2002). Adhikari and Tondkar (1992) reported that financial accounting reporting and disclosure standards and practices do not develop in a vacuum but reflect the particular environment in which they are developed (p. 76). The culture of a country affects its method of accounting and financial reporting. For example, Gary (1988) in his books illustrated one of the ways by which cultural differences affects countries financial reporting; a country with a high uncertainty avoidance and low individualism will tend to be more conservative in their income measurement than in a country with low certainty avoidance and high individualism. Although the measures of cultural attributes may be indistinct and not direct in financial reporting compared with the other factors that affect financial reporting.Also, the nature of accounting regulations in a country is influenced by the general system of law applicable in that country. For example Jaggi and Low (2000), notes that companies in the common laws countries tends to have a high level of disclosures than countries in a codified Roman law system. La Porta et al. (1998) argues that common countries have investors with a strong legal protection than the Roman law countries do. Moreover, the differences in the types of business organization and ownership also affect financial reporting. Elliot and Elliot (2008) further explains this stating that in a country like the UK the business structure indicates a separation of the ownership and the management while in the French business the structure differentiates the ownership from the managers.. According to Nobes and Parker (1 998, p.21):The difference in the providers of finance (creditors/insiders) versus (equity/ outsiders) is the key cause of international differences in financial reporting. Although there is an increasing scale, companies firms had to find extra capital to finance growth. (Alexander, Britton and Jorrisen 2003). Roe (2003), further argues that political differences are the major cause of the differences in corporate structures in the developed western countries. Also the accountancy profession is another determinant of the differences in financial reporting. Nobes and Parker (2006:36) emphasizes that the strength, size, and competence of the accountancy profession in a country affect the type of financial reporting that will be obtained in that country. So with these differences the financial analyst cannot be able to make a headway there is therefore a need for a uniform reporting standards. 2.4 Why the call for international reporting standards Over the years it becomes apparent for an ever increasing worldwide competition. The globalization of the markets and companies increased as a result of the cross-border securities market listings and capital raising.. Thus, there was no cross-border investments, investors therefore prefer to invest in companies whereby there will are more comfortable with their system of accounting . 2.5 Background of the International Reporting Standards. Financial reporting standards for international applicability became prevalent in the 1970s. International Accounting Standards committee (IASC) was set up in the 1973 in order to standardize the reporting differences in international investment communities. The establishment of the International Accounting Standard committee is seen as a response to the call by the accounting profession for a greater co-ordination of accounting rules among the various nations of the world (Kraayenhof 1960).The need was expressed in the international congresses of Accountants held in September, 1972 in Sydney. Chetkovich (1979, p.13) emphasizes that at each of these congresses, there was a demand for a better communications and closer cooperation among accountants on a worldwide basis; and also for greater harmonization of accounting standards. This statement led to the establishment of the IASC on June 29, 1973. The objectives of IASC are: to formulate and publish in the public interest, international standards; also to promote their acceptance and observance world-wide, and to work generally for the improvement and harmonisation of regulations, accounting standards and procedures relating to the presentation of financial statements. (IASC, 1983, Preface to Statements of International Accounting Standards, p.1). This is the first step towards the achievement of a globally recognised standard .The members of the IASC accept that adopting of international accounting standards (IAS) will improve the quality of financial statements (IASC ,1995). How far did this go or were there criticisms to this standard? IASC helped in solving the problem of uniformity although the purpose of it enactment was far from being realised. One of the weaknesses is that the standard issued by IASC has many objectives thereby making it difficult to achieve the purpose of consistency in recognition, measurement and presentation of transactions (IASB section 4). The standard is also too broad and allowed the use of several alternative accounting treatments. Atiken and Wise (1984) emphasizes that the IASC gives more attention to the multinational companies and investors in the multinational businesses more than it emphasizes on the harmonization of all spheres of the organization globally. Therefore emphasizing that IAS C was set up for the harmonization of accounting on a worldwide basis in order to improve the financial reporting and decision-making capability of multinational businesses, and investors in multinational businesses.(p.176). The second criticism to the use of IASC is that of the mandate. The statement starts with the phrase to formulate and publish in the public interest international standards†¦. (IASC). Hence they act in the interest of the public by a way of enforcing the rules which may not be favourable to the public. This absence of democratic legitimacy has been the major reason by which the IASC standards have not been enforced. Besides , this the structure and the membership composition of the IASC lacked the requirements needed for a global standard setting organization which includes the independence of its members, technical expertise and the decision making bodies representatives. McKinnon and Janelle (1983, p.33) argued that IASC has only succeeded in codifying generally accepted practice, in serving as a neutral source of standards ,and in influencing groups with the enforcement powers. Consequently, the IASC was restructured from the year 1998 to 2000 to International Accounting Standards Board (IASB). IASB is an independent London-based standard accounting body privately funded. The first IFRS was issued in the year 2003 with a membership of 19 countries but it has tremendously grown to 70 countries now with the EU mandating that all listed companies should use the IFRS in their financial reporting effective from the year 2005 (EC,2002). IASB has two member bodies the standard setting board and the member board of trustees .The IASB establishment is allied to that of the international federation of Accountants worldwide (IFAC).. The International Accounting Standards Board is committed to developing, in the public interest, a single set of high quality, global accounting standards that require transparent and comparable information in general purpose financial statements in addition, the IASB co-operates with the national accounting standard-setters to achieve con vergence in accounting standards around the world. (IASB, 2002, p.1). IASB has taken corrective measures in removing the accounting alternatives thereby ensuring that firms give a report that will reflect a true position and economic performance of the firm. IASB also aims at promoting global consistency in application and enforcement. It has also met the requirement that the business which operates in multiple bodies have a uniform financial statement which will be understandable in the countries whereby they operate. 2.6 International Accounting Standard Board (IASB) versus FASB? Norwalk agreement in the year 2002 by the Financial accounting Standard Board (FASB) and the International Accounting Standards Board was signed by both bodies after the need for a high quality, consistent and a comparable information which will be applicable to both domestic and the cross border financial reporting was recognized. Jacob and Madu (2009, p.3) the cited that both FASB and the IASB has pledged to use their best efforts in making their existing financial reporting standards fully compatible as is practicable and to coordinate their future work programmes to ensure that once achieved compatibility is maintained. This was also confirmed in their meeting in October 2005 of the two bodies reaffirming their commitments to converge US GAAP to IFRS. In a Concept Release, the SEC(2000) notes, Establishing and maintaining high quality accounting standards are critical to the US approach to regulation of capital markets, which depends on providing high quality information to facilitate informed investment decisions. (Jacob and Madu 2009).SEC released a proposal on July 13 2007, which states that US should recognize financial statements prepared using the IFRS from the foreign private issuers without reconciling them back to GAAP [2].furthermore, SEC informs all the investors that IFRS is the only set of standards with a high quality accounting standards that is more informative, useful for preparing financial reports compared with the US GAAP. This recent move to IFRS suggest that ,IFRS is the only standard that is of high quality and globally recognized and also has a potential to improve comparability of the financial statements despite of the country whereby they are domiciled. Despite all these efforts to converge to IFRS some academic literature still opines this stating that there are still material differences between the IFRS and the US GAAP. More so, the information contained in reconciliation is evident in the investment decisions made by the US investors. for example ,Culter and Neidemeyer (2009) argues that the major challenge why US did not want to adopt the IFRS is that there are differences in regulation and the manner at which these rules are been interpreted. IFRS is principal based regulatory system; which means that the rules are already set. On the other hand US GAAP is ruled based, whereby a detailed guidelines and principles is already laid out. Delliot (2007) emphasized that the principle based rules focuses more on the objective not relying more on the detailed rules. Deming (2005,p.4) gives a conclusive report pointing out that IFRS has more of a common law approach, than the US GAAP which is more of a civil law approach Furthermore, in the number of standards, IFRS has forty nine sta ndards while and nineteen interpretations and this consist of an approximate of two hundred pages (Delliot 2009) while the US GAAP has twenty thousand page (Mitra 2009).Other notable differences are seen in the financial reporting using the US GAAP and the IFRS. This will be comprehensively reviewed in the subsequent chapter. 2.7 Implementation and Enforcement of Financial Reporting Standards The credibility of a standard relies on its smooth implementation by countries that adopts it. Enforcement is a difficult concept to quantify and measure (Nobes and Parker 2006). The enforcement process differs from one country to another. Even at the international level there is still no genuine enforcement process. Moreover, some accounting bodies set standards and leaves enforcement to other bodies while others do both. For example US Securities and Exchange Commission sets laws and enforces it while IASC, Accounting Standards board (ASB) sets and develops standards and do not have the power to enforce these standards For the set rule of IFRS to be achieved an enforcement body has to be set up with powers to enforce the standards (Lamfalussy, 2001; Committee of European Securities Regulators [CESR], 2003a). Nobes and Parker (2008) states that the most determining factor for a successful adoption of this standard as a global standard is in the approach taken by the financial regulating bodies in the countries that adopts it. Giner and Rees (2005), Brown and Tarca (2005 )and Ball(2006 ) affirms that the purpose of IFRS is to provide a high quality financial reporting which can only be achieved with vigorous enforcement by the regulatory bodies (Schipper 2005 and Ball et al. 2003.The enforcement has not been easy certain factor has affected the effective enforcement of the law. Some of them vary from the cost, regulators interest and whether the businesses or accountants really need them. Watts and Zimmerman (1986), opines that the value of regulation is an empirical question, more apprehensive of ho w the regulatory authorities can value the costs and benefits of regulation. For example in the EU countries the structure and the organization that is in charge of the oversight of the requirements in the financial reporting varies among the EU countries. Also some countries do not have institutional oversight of financial reporting (FEE, 2001a, p.10).The EU regulation therefore mandates that the member states are to take appropriate measures in order to ensure compliance with IFRS. (European Commission EC], 2002, n.16). As a result of this the need for a country to produce a multiple financial statements was eliminated. Lafferty (1981) noted that no enforcement mechanism ever existed in reality. Perks (1993), expressed in his opinion that, without a legal backing it is not easy for the reporting standards to be enforced. Enforcing of the accounting standards therefore may require statutory audit, an effective sanctions and monitoring by supervisory bodies and for it to be implemen ted. Thus, there will be continuous reformations and changes in these standards. IFRS AND EU The European Parliamentary on enacted a legislation 0n 14 March 2002 requiring all companies listed in the European stock exchange to publish their financial statements with in accordance with the International financial reporting standards. There is also an endorsement mechanism which ensures that IFRS meets the needs of the EU listed countries. 2.4 International Standardization, Harmonization and Uniformity. The move towards greater harmonization of professional accounting practices has been traced back 1904 and the first accounting congress in St Louis, Missouri (Samuels and Piper, 1985, p.59, Mueller, 1979, p.7). Samuels and Piper (1985 p.59) states that international issues were not important while Mueller (1979 p.7) states that there is a need to pay attention to International harmonization. Combarros (2000), also argues that there is a need for harmonization of the accounting. Harmonization and standardization are used synonymously by some authors (Tay and Parker, 1990). While other researchers has differentiated the two. Tay and Parker (1990, p.73) defined harmonization as a movement away from total diversity of practice and standardisation is seen as a process which involves a movement towards uniformity. Saudagaran (2001:32), futher emphasized that the rationale for harmonization is that it will enhance comparability of financial statements [therefore] making it easier to use acr oss countries While other proponents is of the school of thought that harmonization will is not be practicable or truly probable. Rudhede and Wahlberg (2003) emphasizes that the lack of accounting harmonization will give difficulties to the investors in understanding the accounting principles which varies among the countries. Walton. Moreover, harmonization is a way to put processes in place to be able to reduce the obstacles inherent in international comparability. Hulle (1993, p.73) stated that the objective of harmonization is the comparability of accounts. All the efforts of the EU towards harmonization of these accounting standards have been challenging and slow. 2.4.2 Merits of international harmonization. An argument in favour of international harmonization is, efficiency in trans-border transactions. (Walton, Haller, Raffournier, 1998, p.9). Although lack of uniformity in the reporting procedures and the comparability of the accounting information is another barrier to cross border investments. This comparability of the financial postions across national bodies is seen as one of the most important reason for harmonization (Cummins 1975). This will help to reduce lack of trust and non reliance on the financial statements. With this there will be a flow of international investment in the capital market. Turner (1983 p.58) in his studies affirms that the second advantage of harmonization is to consolidate divergent information when more than one set of report is required to comply with different national laws or practices; further stating that accounting diversity is the major cause why companies spend unnecessarily cost. According to Houston and Reinstein (2001), harmonization of the a ccounting standards will reduce the cost of business, more particularly across national borders, than it will contribute towards greater efficiency of the market regulations. Not only will that harmonization reduce the costs inherent in conducting financial statements analysis and investments in international context. Another advantage of international harmonization of the accounting standards is saving of resources (Muller 1961, Spacek 1971). Further arguments is that international harmonization of the accounting standards can advance capital market efficiency(Ramanna and Sletten 2009) while Ball et al., 2000; Ball Et al 2006 envisaged that if the international market does not go along with the associated capital market institutions can be expensive. Finally, harmonization of the international accounting standards will help in improving management decisions in the multinationals. (Hauworth 1973). 2.4.3 Demerits of international harmonization International harmonization if faced with some criticisms, Some of which are economic while others are political. One of the criticisms is that it cannot carter for a wide range of national circumstances, legal systems, stages of economic development, and cultural differences (Samuel and Piper, 1985, pp 100-109). Atiken and Islam refuted this stating that the nature of the economic transactions and the methods by which they are accounted for does not vary in essence. Walton, Haller, Raffournier, (1998) argued that harmonization distorts social balances that have not been tackled over a long period of time. In the readings of Blake and Hossain (1996) International harmonization of reporting standards especially IASC is less respectful of local particularities; in regards to this context options will be seen as to be bad ,methods are termed either good or bad and costly reconciliations is likely to be imposed. Kenny and Larson (1993) further argued that large professional organizations protect their selfish interest in the standard setting process. Also the absence of a strong professional accounting body is a major obstacle to harmonization of accounting standards. 2.10 Arguments for international reporting. The essence of international reporting standards is to give a universal reporting standard that will be comprehensive and transparent thereby improving investors confidence as well as also creating market integrity. (Hope et al., 2005; dArcy, 2001). In this section we looked at the benefits of international reporting standards to the investors, firms, and also to the global economy. Gordon (2008, p. 3) cited the speech of Levitt (1997) which stating that for international reporting standards to gain acceptance three key objectives must be in place: The standards should include a core set of accounting pronouncements that constitute a comprehensive, generally accepted basis of accounting. The standards must be of high quality – they must result in comparability and transparency and they must provide for full disclosure. The standards must be rigorously interpreted and applied. Financial Reporting quality and transparency under IFRS The question has been if the accounting figures reported under this standard will give of high quality compared to those under domestic standards?. Also will IFRS show transparency in disclosure for an informed decision for investment? Barth et al., (2007) states that this is an extremely intricate question to answer as the application of any given standard has exhibited the effects of the features of the financial reporting system, its standards, as well their interpretation, enforcement and litigation. As these affects the competence of the financial prepares and users. Tarca (2004) said that international accounting standards are one way of improving transparency in financial reporting. Ashbaugh and Pincus (2001) elaborate that since the adoption of IFRS there has been improvement in the forecast accuracy by the analyst. As a result of this analysts cost of information acquisition also reduces. Cuijpers and Buijink (2005) from his sample of firms domiciled in the European Union pr ovide evidence that the analyst following has increased. Also Barth et al (2003) and Barth et al (2007) reveal that higher value relevance for firms is higher since the adoption of the IFRS as compared with the pre adoption period. IFRS therefore reduces the estimation of risk in market returns. Hence we will say that the quality of the IFRS in financial reporting is therefore inestimable in countries that adopt IFRS than those that use the locally recognised standards. Although we have affirmed that IFRS is associated with a high accounting quality there may be oppositions to this. Firstly, where there is an intrinsic flexibility in the principles based standards; this may present opportunities for firms to manage their earning thereby reducing the accounting quality. Also, in a bit to limit the managerial discretion which relates to the accounting alternatives will also reduce the ability of the firm to report accounting measurements that will give a reflection of what the true po sition and economic performance of the company is. Thus, accounting regime affects the quality of the information thereby affecting the cost of capital. Cost of capital and IFRS Adoption There are various propositions on the whether the adoption of IFRS reduces liquidity and lower cost of capital. Before the adoption of IFRS investors have to spend some time and effort in translating the standards in a way they can to understand. This process wastes efforts time and incurs transaction cost. The cost of capital determines how risky an investment would be. The higher the cost of capital the more risky the investment will be. According to (Coffee 2002), findings on bonding theory there is a lowered cost of capital. Deske (2006) affirms that this associated reduction in information cost is the main benefits by which IFRS is being adopted. There will be a reduced cost since the same standard will be used by all countries not regarding where the countries are domiciled. Aras and Crowther (2008) argued that the reduction in the cost of information in the adoption of IFRS and an assured consequent reduction can only benefit the countries whose legal, cultural, and economic s ystem is the same with the nations which are involved in setting IFRS, hence other countries which are not beneficial to this may incur increased cost compliance. Although, Barth (2007); Marquez-Ramos (2008) emphasized that IFRS reduces information cost of an economy as capital flows and trade becomes globalised. Improved comparability of the accounting reports: The use of IFRS eliminates the lack of comparability of financial statements. Choi et al. 1999, p. 249 states that comparability eliminate the current misunderstandings of the investors on the reliability of foreign financial statements and this removes one of the most main impediments affecting the flow of international investment. It also makes it easier for companies to compare financial results of different reporting entities from different countries. Global recognition Globalization of the business activities has increased creating a need for comparability of financial information between firms of different countries .Most of the companies are going globalized therefore the use of national accounting rules is increasingly impairing effective communication both in internal and external reporting. In a recent study by the international federation of Accountants(IFAC) most accounting leaders all over the world has agreed that adopting IFRS will be vital for economic growth in their countries. It is also significant as it will make it easier to compare human capital needs of companys subsidiaries all over the world since professionals will be more mobile. IFRS improves profit figures: The movement from the domestically recognized standards to the internationally recognized standards has resulted to a tremendous increase in the net profit figures of top most countries financial reports although the balance sheets have deteriorated. It is noted already that IFRS requires a comprehensive reporting than the domestic standards. IFRS has determined the various accounting methods by which profit figures will be derived from and reported by the firms (Aras and Crowther 2008). Impact of IFRS on financial reporting Examining financial statement implications is important because, †¦ the only direct effects †¦ are changed financial statements †¦ (Hung and Subramanyan, 2004, p.4) Pijper (2009), further examines how IFRS has affected the reporting of financing on the balance sheet. In GAAP the put option were disclosed in a footnote as an off balance sheet figure, but with the IFRS the put options which is held by minorities are now treated as a financial liabilities. Prior to the adoption of IFRS most companies were very conservative in their depreciation rates and this was affecting the business profits in that some assets will still be in use and there is no report on the expense incurred against those assets in the income statements but now the IFRS has reduced the distortions b these excessive prudent nature of depreciation rates .From the studies of (Hung and Subramanyan 2004) IFRS emphasized that fair value should be used for balance sheet valuation. Barth et al (2005) from hi s studies discovered that companies that uses IFRS experienc