EFFECTS OF ETHICAL PRACTICES ON CORPORATE GOVERNANCE IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES: EVIDENCE FROM LEBANON AND EGYPT

Companies in some developing countries, such as those in the Middle East and North Africa region, do not place high importance on ethical behavior and practices within the organization. The aim of this study is to examine the effects of ethical behavior and practices within small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) in developing countries on promoting good corporate governance. Data collected in Lebanon and Egypt provided evidence that ethics impact all major corporate governance categories. A deeper analysis of the relationships enabled the profiling of SMEs with lower levels of corporate governance relative to Ownership Structure. The findings created a path for useful recommendations to enhance corporate governance, in particular the Ownership Structure category, through adopting expedient ethical practices.

Introduction
The importance of Corporate Governance is apparent from the vast expansion in its literature across various fields, such as management, economics, accounting, and finance. Corporate governance is generally known as the set of actions and mechanisms by which enterprises are directed, controlled, and monitored (Larcker, Richardson, &Tuna, 2007). In the narrower sense, it is concerned with increasing stakeholders' capital. While in the broader sense, corporate governance is concerned with the well-being of society, including stakeholders. This topic has raised various stakeholder concerns. As a result, large socially responsible stakeholders have leveraged their power to guide board decisions into being more ethical.
Ethics is a normative science which relates to human behavior. It is the morals, standards and guidelines upon which an individual within a culture operates. However, reaching an international understanding of ethics can be problematic. In some firms, it is substituted with responsible business code and/or integrity. On the other hand, business ethics is the art of applying ethical principles to examining and solving complex moral dilemmas. Its aim is to indoctrinate a sense of how organizations should conduct themselves responsibly. A business is not considered ethical unless it attempts a tradeoff between pursuing economic growth and fulfilling social obligations.
Major corporate scandals happened because of a lack of adherence to good corporate governance structures. The lack of corporate governance was at the root of the financial crisis that took the world by storm, rendering global instability (United States Financial Crisis Report, 2011). According to Othman & Abdul Rahman (2011) and Arjoon (2005), companies lack moral compasses for good governance, thus plaguing society at large-including shareholders and stakeholders-and causing a deterioration in governance systems worldwide. Therefore, it is important to examine corporate governance from a moral stance. Delving into ethics and moral principles is essential to creating a culture of ethics in a business environment that is sure to guarantee a system for effective corporate governance.
Effective corporate governance requires distinct traits: accountability (of the management, board of directors, and audit committee), responsibility (of the firm towards its investors), and transparency (in the organization's activities and structures).When compared to developed countries, developing economies face more challenges when applying corporate governance practices. According to McGee (2010), some of these challenges include: pyramid ownership structures, relation-based governance, finding active owners and skilled managers amid disseminated ownership structures, protecting and enforcing minority shareholders' rights; cultivating technical and professional know-how and depoliticizing decision-making among others.
The subject of corporate governance has gained momentum in the Arab region as early as 2001 (Saidi, 2004). In 2003, the first MENA regional corporate governance forum was launched that assessed the state of corporate governance and discussed the trends and challenges facing corporate governance in the region. Nonetheless, studies on corporate governance in SMEs have concerted chiefly on developed countries and less on developing economies. According to Saidi (2004, p.85), "SMEs and FOEs constitute over 85 percent of the corporate universe in the MENA countries." It is then essential to examine this matter in SMEs from a milieu of developing economies as corporate governance shows a discrepancy across different cultures (Abor & Adjasi, 2007). In line with the aforementioned, the aim of this study is to examine the effects of ethical behavior and practices within SMEs in developing countries on promoting good corporate governance practices; mainly, Lebanon and Egypt.

Literature review
Researchers cannot agree on a single definition of corporate governance. However, it is commonly understood as a system that structures and operates a company in order to please creditors and shareholders, satisfy employee interests, maintain customer and supplier relations, and comply with mandates and regulations (Cadbury, 2000). However, corporate governance is not just about compliance with laws and regulations; rather, it is a strategic business system that maximizes firm value on the long term, while protecting the interests of stakeholders (Gompers et. al, 2003). The major categories contributing to the success of corporate governance (Dahawy, 2007)

Transparency of financial data (disclosure)
Most of the businesses in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) nations are SMEs or family-owned enterprises (FOEs). These countries feature large gaps on aspects of corporate governance in comparison to industrialized nations. Braendle, Omidvar, & Tehraninasr (2013) affirm that corporate governance is specifically imperative in the Middle East. These economies show an absence of the conventionally established infrastructure which deals with corporate governance subjects. A study conducted by Hassan (2013) in Egypt shows the failure of enterprises to clearly disclose information which may be attributed to some ineptitude and inadequacy in the regulatory framework of Egypt. This can also be ascribed to socio-economic issues in the country. It is then anticipated that it will take a long time for Egyptian companies to consider the benefits of a larger level of corporate governance disclosure (Samaha et al, 2012). Moreover, Chakroun & Matoussi (2012) studied the relation between the internal and external mechanisms of corporate governance and corporate voluntary disclosure through annual reports of Tunisia (MENA region country). The outcomes of the study strongly demonstrate that corporate intended disclosure is vastly influenced by the internal and external governance mechanisms.
Information disclosure is a necessity for corporate governance that is why the Lebanese Transparency Association established specific guiding principles for disclosure for SMES and FOEs (Koldertsova, 2010). Regardless, such codes in Lebanon, or the MENA region at large, remain of a voluntary nature rather than strict guidelines. A study by Elgammal, Assad & Jourdi (2014), on the implementation of corporate governance rules and procedures in Lebanese firms, indicated a low level of disclosure. The authors believe that this could be attributed to the lack of awareness of the benefits of proper corporate governance among top managers and stakeholders. The extent of disclosure exposes the power of the manager in decision making, and the allocation of this power between the manager and the shareholders (Khlif & Souissi, 2010). Allegrini & Greco (2011), claim that a larger board size is positively related to corporate voluntary disclosure. This is not necessarily true for SMES. According to Utama (2012), SMEs have a lower level of disclosure.

Analysis of ownership structure and control privileges
Country characteristics, such as the legal protection for minority shareholders and the echelon of economic and financial growth, affect the enterprises' expenses and benefits in employing actions to perk up their governance and transparency. According to Khali, Saffar, & Trabelsi (2014), the variation in the quality of protection made available to shareholders across nations result in discernible variation in financial contracting. Companies in developing nations find it most advantageous to spend less in terms of governance, and the rights of minority stakeholders is usually specified at the country level, not at the company level (Doidge, Karolyi, & Stulz, 2007). Effectual corporate governance is vital, though, for enterprises in developing countries since it can result in managerial vividness and excellence, and assist in raising capital (Okpara, 2011).
Within Lebanon, corporate governance is a fairly late occurrence and therefore, there is a shortage of research on practices of corporate governance in the nation's firms. Thus, putting into practice a welldeveloped corporate governance system is relatively difficult as many SMEs are inclined to operate and manage their business by themselves instead of following a definite set of policies and regulations, and thus fail to recognize the significance of corporate governance. Also, the regulatory system in Lebanon remains to be weak and the regime of politics is unsteady. Most SMEs are controlled by families either by owning majority of voting shares or through elaborate paramedical structures (such a structure allows families to have control over a number of subsidiaries and/or holding companies through ownership of a small equity percentage in each business). Under the Lebanese commercial law, shares with unequal voting rights can be issued by companies; thus, allowing families to be decision makers in the company regardless of the number of shares (Salloum, et al., 2013). According to Abdel Shahid (2001), under Egyptian law, the concept of independent directors is not well established even among listed companies, and no separation exists between the role of the chairman and managing director. Also, there are no rules governing the composition between non-executive and executive directors. Nevertheless, the Egyptian Institute of Directors was a pioneer in introducing corporate governance systems in the MENA region. It introduced a corporate governance code for stateowned enterprises (SOE) and in 2006 for SMEs (Gamal El Din, 2009).
In general, the majority of developing countries do not encompass a sturdy regulatory system which ensures a proper application of corporate governance (Mulili and Wong, 2011;Young et al., 2008). However, as Lebanon becomes part of the World Trade Organization and integrates internationally, the structure and organization of its enterprises ought to be assessed and modifications should take place in order to enhance growth, efficiency, and competitiveness (Saidi, 2004).

Structure of board of directors and management
Much has been written about the duties/roles of the board of directors in setting the organization's ethical values. The board is responsible for articulating, determining and communicating the standards and values of the business, and for making sure that the procedures, policies and controls are in place to promote, rather than deter, ethical values throughout the business community. According to Salloum et al. (2013) "Lebanon's experience with corporate boards and their effectiveness as a control mechanism are not well known because of the lack of transparency. Separation of ownership and control has not yet been fully realized." In SMEs, the ownership, top management, and the board of directors often imbricate, with the same person, or the same family, in charge (Brunninge, Nordqvist, & Wiklund, 2007). The amalgamation of ownership and management makes the manager less subject to pressure from other monitors and investors who stipulate information transparency and disclosure. This pressure encountered is augmented with the size of the firm (Carney, 2005).
Some corporate governance research has adopted the Agency Theory approach which centers on the principal-agent relationship, utterly concentrating on resolving conflicts of interest between management and shareholders (Brennan & Solomon, 2008;Jensen & Meckling, 1976). In small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), where the owners can also be the managers and/or shareholders, the agency problems are less apt to subsist.

Corporate social responsibility
A business is regarded as ethical if it attempts to reach a valid balance between trailing economic purpose and acting upon its obligation to society. Kostyuk et al. (2013) assert that firms are being adjured to accept responsibility for how their operations sway the environment and the society. Ayadi et al. (2014) affirm that corporate social responsibility (CSR) is not a waste of firm resources that are scarce but rather a momentous feature of stakeholder value creation. Even though there has been a growing interest in CSR in recent years, not much of the practice of CSR is recognized in developing countries. For instance, Lebanon, as a post-war nation, cannot be exemplified as the most prolific base for CSR intentions to prosper (Jamali & Mirshak, 2007

Analysis of auditing committee and elements
Corporate governance is also about preparing a system of check-and-balance to avoid authority abuse and to guarantee the integrity of financial statements (Mahmood, 2008). Corporate governance should be examined from a moral standpoint, especially after revealing scantiness of its structures through several corporate scandals and deception (Arjoon, 2005) such as the Enron case which was a foremost reason for passing on the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. According to Arjoon (2005), creating a corporation culture of moral values and high ethical standards is the funnel to endorsing a successful governance system of responsibility, honesty, transparency, and accountability.
The key fundamentals of a code of corporate governance generally include the Board of Directors, corporate financial reporting, an independent external audit, and an internal audit (Mahmood, 2008). It has been shown that an elevated quality of internal audit positively influences corporate governance (El-Kassar, Elgammal, & Bayoud, 2014).
According to Rossouw (2005, p.37), "corporate governance has a distinct ethical nature". All aspects of corporate governance are simply "means to ensure that the corporation will act in a manner that is fair, accountable, responsible, and transparent." Many studies have emphasized the critical role of ethics in corporate governance (see for example; Othman &Abdul Rahman, 2011; Arjoon, 2005). Abdul Rahman and Othman (2011) studied the role ethics plays in corporate governance. Their results indicated that ethical position (independent bodies and whistle blower), ethical principles (corporate philosophy) and ethical structure (ethical reporting, code of ethics,), are essential requirements to promoting governance practices (Othman &Abdul Rahman, 2011).

Business ethics
Generally, business ethics is the application of ethical ideals and moral principles in an organizational setting. It assists in distinguishing between morally right and wrong business decisions as well as identifying benefits and harms linked with ethical matters within the enterprise (Crane & Matten, 2007). Mahmood (2008) connotes that while many large companies have obtained their reputation by applying ethical standards, SMEs in the world are progressively becoming more alert to the significance of trustworthy dealings with employees, clients, suppliers and society. Nevertheless, SMEs in developing countries require more understanding and awareness of the implication of business ethics and its benefits. SMEs may not be able to recognize these gains because of the lack of a long-term vision. This is particularly true for Lebanon, which ranks 136th out of 175 countries by The Corruption Perceptions Index of 2014, rank 1 being the cleanest country and rank 175 the most corrupt. Even though Egypt ranks above Lebanon at 94, it still encloses more corruption than other Arab countries.

Research questions
Since the main purpose of the study is to examine the effects of ethical behavior and practices within SMEs in developing countries on endorsing good corporate governance practices, the research questions that will be addressed to determine the impact of ethics on the different categories of corporate governance are as follows:  Determine the corporate governance categories that are significantly affected by level of ethical behavior and practices and identify the categories that are most and least affected.
 Examine the aspects of ethical behavior and practices that significantly affect the corporate governance categories.
 Explain the relationships for the corporate governance category least affected by ethical behavior.
 Determine whether the relationship between ethical behavior and a corporate governance category differ across the groups or levels of the various corporate demographical variables.

Methodology
This research set out to study the ethical behavior and practices within SMEs in developing countries (Lebanon and Egypt) and its effect on corporate governance practices.

Research design
The study is quantitative for the results were measured numerically and analyzed. Moreover, the study is a combination of both a descriptive and explanatory nature. An explanatory study, however, is more emphasized since the research establishes a causal relationship between ethical behavior and corporate governance practices. The research is a cross-sectional study since it involved a one-time interaction with the sample.

Sample and questionnaire
The target population of the research is SMEs operating in developing countries in the MENA region. A questionnaire was distributed to SMEs in Lebanon and Egypt randomly chosen from a list of SMEs provided by the Chambers of Commerce in both countries. Of the 400 questionnaires distributed (200 in Lebanon and 200 in Egypt), 147 were returned, yielding a response rate of 36.75%.
A questionnaire was self-administered. The questionnaire included three parts of fixed-alternative questions of mostly a Choice Determinant and Likert Scale type. The first part asked demographics. The individual demographics included age, gender, years of experience, types of professional certificates, and qualifications. Moreover, the corporate demographics questions asked about size of the company, board size, frequency of board meetings, CEO compensation, sales, difference in annual sales, and debt ratio. The second part, included self-created questions related to the ethical aspect in corporate governance, shown in Table 1 below. Using a 5-point Likert scale (ranging from Strongly Agree to Strongly Disagree), the third part of the set of questions asked respondents about their perception of the existence and/or effectiveness of the items that make up the five major categories of corporate governance (see Tables 2 to 6 below).
To address the research question of how ethics impacts the various categories of corporate governance, a score for each of these categories is constructed by averaging the responses of the items constituting the categories. In addition to these five scores, an overall corporate governance score and a score for ethics are also constructed. These scores will be denoted by:  TRSS for Transparency of Financial Data score.
 OWNS for Analysis of Ownership Structure and Control Privileges score.
 BRDS for structure of Board of Directors and Management score.
 CSRS for Corporate Social Responsibility score.
 ADTS for Analysis of Auditing committee and elements score.
 GCS for Corporate Governance score.  ETHS for ethics score. These scores, along with the demographics variables and the individual items, will be used to conduct the statistical analysis. Table 1. Ethics and its role in corporate governance ETH1: The interest of the organization is prioritized over personal advantages. ETH2: The interest of stakeholders is prioritized over personal advantages. ETH3: Following moral norms and values by managers and employees are warranted. ETH4: A reward system exists for following the code of good conduct. ETH5: Employees not abiding by the code of good conduct are disciplined. ETH6: Recently, immoral behavior has not been encountered or successfully contained. ETH7: Employees who follow rules of good conduct and moral principles are appreciated and valued. ETH8: A moral strategy in business planning and decisions is followed. ETH9: A moral corporate culture is promoted and supported. ETH10: The interests of all stakeholders are considered in decision making. ETH11: A whistleblower program protection exists. ETH12: Activities of the board, management, and employees are guided by the moral code of good conduct. ETH13: The organization's members share a common set of beliefs, values, and practices. ETH14: Employees are pushed to be truthful in their reporting and their practices. ETH15: Employees are treated fairly and equally, with no one employee treated with favoritism. ETH16: Employees are treated with respect. ETH17: Fundamental values in culture such as integrity and dependability are integrated. ETH18: Employees are rewarded for their high level of performance and involvement. ETH19: Managers and employees are encouraged to be compassionate in their decision. ETH20: Reporting accurate and reliable financial statements is ensured. ETH21: Responsibility towards the organizations and the community is encouraged. ETH22: Building and establishing employees' credibility is ensured.    Table 6. Analysis of auditing committee and elements ADT1: Procedures governing collaboration with external auditors ADT2: Procedures and responsibilities for appointing internal auditors ADT3: Reliability of external auditors and board's confidence ADT4: Procedures governing collaboration with internal auditors ADT5: Decision making procedure for appointing external auditors ADT6: Internal control systems ADT7: Period of auditor contracts ADT8: Audit partner rotation process ADT9: The remuneration of auditors and involvement in non-audit work

Results and discussion
In the following, the results of the data analysis are presented and discussed.

Reliability
The first step in analyzing the results of the survey was to conduct reliability analysis on each of the five categories of corporate governance as well as the part of the survey related to Ethics. The results revealed the following Cronbach's Alpha values of 0.935, 0.886, 0.939, 0.899, and 0.913 for the Corporate Governance categories and 0.948 for the Ethics part. These results indicate that the data is highly reliable to proceed with further statistical analysis.

Demographics
Pertaining to the age of the respondents, the majority were above the age of 40, 31.5% were between the ages of 30 and 40, and 28.8% fell into the age category of less than 30 years old. Moreover, most of the survey participants were males, 45.2% were females. As for the years of experience, 58% had more than 10 years of experience, 50% had 5 to 10 years, and 36% had less than 5 years of experience. Furthermore, with respect to holding a specific type of certificate, 31.5% had CPA, 9.6% CIA, and 6.8% CA. 12.3% of the respondents had no university degree.
In reference to the corporate demographic variables, the majority of SMEs had more than 50 employees, 10.4% had 20-50, and 17.3% had 1-19 employees. Additionally, 50.7% of SMEs had a board of directors of 5-10 individuals, 28.8% had a board size of more than 10, and 20.5% had a board between 1-4 people. Moreover, as to the frequency of the board meetings, 36.3% reported meeting 1-3 times a year, 35.6% met more than 6 times, and 26% met 4-6 times. Furthermore, regarding CEO compensation, 38.4% were compensated $250,000 a year, 31.5% made between $100,000 and $150,000, 17.8% were paid between $150,000 and $250,000, 8.2% made between $50,000 and $100,000, and only 4.1% were paid less than $50,000. Likewise, as to the annual sales of the SMEs, 53.4% claimed to make more than $1,000,000, 12.3% made sales ranging between $500,000 and $1,000,000, 17.8% made between $100,000 and $500,000, and 8.2% made less than $100,000.
Because of the small difference in the sales of the SMEs that made less than a million dollars per year, the enquiry was divided into two categories; the SMEs that made less than $1,000,000, and the SMEs that made $1,000,000 or more. Results demonstrate that 32.4% of SMEs made less than $1,000,000 a year, and 52% made $1,000,000 or more. When asked about the change of their sales from year to year, 32.9% of SMEs reported a significant increase, 33.5% reported a slight increase, and 17.9% of the companies did not witness any increase. Lastly, 50.7% of the SMEs stated a debt ratio ranging between 25% and 50%, 28.8% a debt ratio of less than 25%, and 12.3% claimed a ratio of more than 50%.

Scores
For each of the corporate governance categories, a score is constructed by averaging the responses of the items constituting the categories. Table 7 below shows the descriptive statistics for the score of the combined sample, as well as for each of the two countries, Lebanon and Egypt. The results of the tests comparing the means are also displayed. It is worth noting that no significant differences in the mean scores were found for any of the corporate governance categories. Therefore, no separate analysis will be done for each individual country.

Correlation analysis
To examine the relationships between ethics and the corporate governance categories, correlation analysis is conducted as a first step. Table 8 below shows the correlation coefficients between the overall ethical score and the corporate governance categories scores.
The results indicate that the critical value for the two tailed test is 0.213 for a level of significance of 0.01.  8 reveal that the ethics score is significantly correlated to each of the corporate governance categories' scores as well as the overall corporate governance score. Moreover, all correlation coefficients are positive. Thus, the findings indicate that higher ethical behavior and practices lead to a greater level of corporate governance in terms of all five categories. Further examination of the correlations show that ethical behavior and practices impact the corporate social responsibility category the most, followed by transparency, audit committee, and board of directors. The category least affected is ownership structure and control, although, the effects of ethical behavior on this category is significant. The high correlation between ethics score and the corporate social responsibility score may be attributed to the fact that some of the few items in the CSR category are very similar to the ethics items.
In order to investigate the reason behind the ownership structure being less influenced by ethical behavior like the other categories, Factor analysis was conducted on the ethics items. The results grouped the items into two factors. The first grouped items related to the encouragement of ethical behavior. These items are (refer to table 1): ETH21, ETH22, ETH20, ETH16, ETH19, ETH18, ETH14, ETH17, ETH12 and ETH7. On the other hand, the second group consists of the ethical practices items, which are: ETH4, ETH2, ETH1, ETH6, ETH3, ETH15, ETH8, ETH9, ETH10, ETH11, ETH13, and ETH5. Two scores, based on averaging the items, were constructed; the ethical encouragement score (ETHENCS) and the ethical practices score (ETHPRCS). These scores were correlated to the corporate governance scores. The results are shown in Table 9 below. It is worth noting that the correlations between Ownership Structure and the two Ethics factors are both significant at a level of 0.01. The degree of correlation differs, with low ethical encouragement and high ethical practices. Thus, ethical practices impact more ownership structure than ethical encouragement.

Analysis of variance
Analysis of variance (ANOVA) test was conducted on each score using the various corporate demographic variables to determine whether differences in the mean scores exist across the classes of these variables. Results illustrate that there is a significant difference in the Ownership Structure score relative to the various size categories of the SMEs. This provides strong evidence that the size of a company affects the ownership structure. Additionally, the results showed significant differences in all of the scores of the corporate governance categories, except that of Transparency of Financial Results. Also, significant differences were found in the ethics scores as well as the overall corporate governance score.
Other ANOVA tests were conducted by using the remaining corporate demographic variables. A summary of the results are depicted in Table 10 below.
Examining the results concerning the Ownership Structure of the SMEs, Table 10 reveals significant differences in the mean Ownership Structure scores relative to size, sales, debt ratio, and sales differences. However, no significant differences were found in relation to the board size and the frequency of board meetings.
Further investigations reveal that a significantly lower level of corporate governance in terms of ownership structure was portrayed for smaller-sized enterprises with lower sales, a debt ratio between 25% and 50%, having no increase in sales, and CEO compensation within the range of $100,000 and $250,000.

Conclusion
Past research on corporate governance has stressed more on developed nations rather than on developing economies. However, to ensure success, it is crucial for SMEs to incorporate an effective governance system. This in turn will help further boost investor confidence and develop the company's investment potential and growth on the long run (Fawzy, 2003).
Results of the study show that higher ethical behavior and practices lead to a greater level of corporate governance in terms of all five categories. Corporate social responsibility category is impacted by ethics category the most, followed by transparency, audit committee, and board of directors. The category least affected is ownership structure. Moreover, the results demonstrate that ethical practices and encouragement are positively related to ownership structure and control; though, practices ethical indicated a higher correlation with ownership structure than encouragement. In addition, findings illustrate a significantly lower level of corporate governance relative to ownership structure for smaller-sized enterprises with lower sales, average debt ratio and CEO compensation, and having no increase in sales. It is then recommended for SMEs leader to engage in the following practices in order to improve their corporate governance outcome with respect to ownership structure and control:  Set up an ethical code of conduct and share it with employees while making sure they practice what they preach.
 Set up a system that rewards those who abide by the code of good conduct, discipline those who do not, and protect whistleblowers.
 Follow a moral strategy when planning and making decisions.
 Implement programs to promote and support a moral corporate culture.
 Prioritize the interest of the organization and the stakeholders over personal advantages.
Some of the limitations of this study are the small sample size, and the restriction to solely two developing countries from the MENA region.
For future research, it is recommended to target stakeholders other than managers in order to investigate their perception regarding ethical considerations about their companies' corporate governance practices. In addition, further research can also target larger organizations and publicly-owned or listed corporations, which can reveal the truth behind their implementations of corporate governance practices at large. It is also recommended to extend the study to other MENA region countries.


A Study of the Antecedents and the Consequences of Social Network Service Addiction

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of job demand on employees’ social network service addiction and how it influences their job...

perspectives of SNS addiction. First, some researchers argue that SNS addiction is a disorder requiring clinical treatment, for those people addicted to using SNSs experience symptoms similar to those experienced by those who suffer from addictions to substances or other behaviors (Block, 2008;Brenner, 1997;Chao and Nestler, 2004;Leshner, 1997;Griffiths, 2005;Shaffer, et al., 2005;Echeburua & Corral, 2010). Second, Kang et al. (2013) argue that the phenomenon of excessive SNS usage is an addictive consumption trait of SNS, defined as an intensive consumer behavior with great loyalty arising from the benefits of social network services. Finally, because unlike other addictions, SNS is an integral element of today's professional and leisure culture (Kuss & Griffiths, 2011), the ultimate therapy aim is controlled use of the SNS and its respective functions (Echeburua & Corral, 2010). The therapy of SNS addiction should be different from those of other addiction.
However, although the nature or the therapy of SNSs addiction is different from other addiction, if employees use and commit SNSs excessively rather than work hard, it will make a matter of great concern in the workplaces from the perspective of most companies except SNSs providers.
In this study, to examine the organizational behaviors related to SNS addiction in further, the first step is to investigate the organizational factors which arouse SNS addiction. Second, we will investigate how SNS addiction influences the organizational attitudes of employee. Finally, this study will find out the factors which can manage SNS addiction in the workplace.

Ⅱ. Theoretical Background & Hypothesis Development
A. Social Network Service Addiction Social Networking Sites (SNSs) are virtual communities where users can create individual public profiles, interact with real-life friends, and meet other people based on shared interests (Kuss & Girraffiths, 2011). SNSs are predominantly used for social purposes, mostly related to the maintenance of established offline networks, relative to individual ones. However, recent evidence suggests that individuals may feel compelled to maintain their online social networks in a way that may, in some circumstances, lead to using SNSs excessively (Kang et al., 2013). Such obsession and excessive use of an object is often described as SNS addiction (Kuss and Griffiths, 2011).
Relevant researchers have three perspectives of SNS addiction. First, SNS addiction is a disorder requiring clinical treatment. In the clinical fields (i.e. medicine, psychology, pharmacology, neuroscience, etc.), where addiction is traditionally studied, addiction is caused by initial engagement with and consequent obsession about the benefits provided by psychotropic substances (Block, 2008;Brenner, 1997;Chao and Nestler, 2004;Leshner, 1997). Some of the symptoms of addiction are withdrawal, conflict, tolerance, and other problematic outcomes. In accordance with the biopsychosocial framework for the etiology of addictions (Griffiths, 2005) and the syndrome model of addiction (Shaffer, et al., 2005), it is claimed that those people addicted to using SNSs experience symptoms similar to those experienced by those who suffer from addictions to substances or other behaviors (Echeburua & Corral, 2010).
Second, Kang et al. (2013) argue that it is inappropriate to include excessive usage of SNSs under those of other highly impulsive internet services such as pornography, gaming, and internet shopping, for excessive usage of SNSs does not cause much harm to the individual or society since the utilities of SNSs retain diminishing marginal utility. Even they call the phenomenon of excessive SNS usage an addictive consumption trait (ACT) of SNS, defined as intensive consumer behavior with great loyalty arising from the benefits of social network services and suggest five underlying dimensions of ACT of SNS including salience, euphoria, immersion, compulsion and association.
Finally, the therapy of SNS addiction should be different from those of other addictions. Unlike other addictions, the goal of SNS addiction treatment cannot be total abstinence from using the internet, for it is an integral element of today's professional and leisure culture (Kuss & Griffiths, 2011). Instead, the ultimate therapy aim is controlled use of the internet and its respective functions (Echeburua & de Corral (2010). Turel and Serenko (2012) recently summarized three overarching theoretical perspectives to explain the formation of SNS addiction. First, cognitive-behavioral model emphasizes that 'abnormal' social networking arises from maladaptive cognitions and is amplified by various environmental factors, and eventually leads to compulsive and/or addictive social networking. Second, social skill model emphasizes that 'abnormal' social networking arises because people lack self-presentational skills and prefer virtual communication to face-to-face interactions, and it eventually leads to compulsive and/or addictive use of social networking. Second, socio-cognitive model emphasizes that 'abnormal' social networking arises due to the expectation of positive outcomes, combined with internet self-efficacy and deficient internet self-regulation eventually leads to compulsive and/or addictive social networking behavior.

B. Antecedents
Most of relevant studies have focused on the perspectives of social skill model or socio-cognitive model. They have suggested that because SNS are designed as a tool for interpersonal communication, psychological profile of their addictive user can be even more specific. Therefore, similar set of personality traits appeared to be associated with the excessive SNS use, such as: low self-esteem and low life satisfaction (Amichai-Hamburger & Vinitzky, 2010;Kuss & Griffiths, 2011;Tazghini & Siedlecki, 2013;Wilson et al., 2010), those scored higher on the trait of neuroticism and conscientiousness Amichai-Hamburger & Vinitzky, 2010, lower levels of openness to experience (Ross et al., 2009;Skues, Williams & Wise, 2012).
However, a few studies show the perspective of cognitive-behavioral model. Xu and Tan (2012) suggest that the transition from normal to problematic social networking use occurs when social networking is viewed by the individual as an important (or even exclusive) mechanism to relieve stress, loneliness, or depression. They contend that those who are poor at socializing in real life frequently engage in social networking. For these people, social media use provides such people continuous rewards (e.g. self-efficacy, satisfaction) and they end up engaging in the activity more and more, eventually leading to many problems (e.g., ignoring real life relationships, work/educational conflicts, etc.).
The purpose of this study is to examine the organizational behaviors related to SNS addiction. Therefore, in the perspective of cognitive-behavioral model, we pay our attention to work environmental factors arousing SNS addiction and suggest job demand as antecedents of SNS addiction.
At the heart of the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) model (Bakker et al., 2003a;Demerouti et al., 2001a, b) lies the assumption that whereas every occupation may have its own specific risk factors associated with job stress, these factors can be classified in two general categories (i.e. job demands and job resources), thus constituting an overarching model that may be applied to various occupational settings, irrespective of the particular demands and resources involved.
Especially, job demands refer to those physical, psychological, social, or organizational aspects of the job that require sustained physical and/or psychological (cognitive and emotional) effort or skills and are therefore associated with certain physiological and/or psychological costs. Examples are a high work pressure, an unfavorable physical environment, and emotionally demanding interactions with clients. Although job demands are not necessarily negative, they may turn into job stressors when meeting those demands requires high effort from which the employee has not adequately recovered (Meijman and Mulder, 1998).
According to transactional stress models, the nature and severity of emotional reactions following exposure to job demands are functions of dynamic interplay between event characteristics and individual appraisal and coping processes (Folkman and Lazarus, 1991;Lazarus, 1999;Zapf and Einarsen, 2003). Especially, the both of job demands are characterized as a prolonged exposure to interpersonal acts of a negative nature, with which the target is unable to cope. These characteristics are likely to make up a highly stressful situation characterized by lack of control.
The stress from job demands may then exacerbate individuals' undesirable moods. This then leads such individuals to engage in the social networking behavior even more as a way of relieving dysphoric mood states. Consequently, when social network users repeat this cyclical pattern of relieving undesirable moods with social media use, the level of psychological dependency on social networking increases. Accordingly, the following hypothesis is established.
H1: Job demands are positively associated with SNS addiction.

C. Consequences
Some studies highlight that in some circumstances, SNS usage can lead to a variety of negative consequences that imply a potential decrease in involvement in real-life communities and worse academic performance, as well as relationship problems in the various context. First, the results of an online survey of 184 internet users indicated that people who use SNS more in terms of time spent on usage were perceived to be less involved with their real life communities (Nyland et al., 2007).
Second, according to a more recent study assessing the relationships between Facebook usage and academic performance in a sample of 219 university students (Kirschner & Karpinski, 2010), Facebook users had lower Grade Point Averages and spent less time studying than students who did not use this SNS. Of the 26% of students reporting an impact of their usage on their lives, three-quarters (74%) claimed that it had a negative impact, namely procrastination, distraction, and poor time-management. A potential explanation for this may be that students who used the Internet to study may have been distracted by simultaneous engagement in SNSs, implying that this form of multitasking is detrimental to academic achievement (Kirschner & Karpinski, 2010).
Third, it appears that the usage of Facebook may in some circumstances have negative consequences for romantic relationships. The disclosure of rich private information on one's Facebook page including status updates, comments, pictures, and new friends, can result in jealous cyberstalking (Phillips, 2009)., including interpersonal electronic surveillance (Tokunaga, 2011) by one's partner. This was reported to lead to jealousy (Muise, 2009;Persch, 2007) and, in the most extreme cases, divorce and associated legal action (Luscombe, 2009).
However, few studies of SNS addiction have been interested in the context of workplace. Like other context, if employees spend a lot of time using and committing SNSs excessively rather than work hard, it will make a matter of negative consequences in the workplace. We suggest job satisfaction and organizational citizenship behavior as two kinds of consequences which are negatively influenced by SNS addiction.
First, job satisfaction conveys useful information about an individual's economic, social, and personal life as it is a major determinant of labor market mobility (Freeman, 1978), job performance (Mount, Ilies & Johnson, 2006), and personal well-being (Rode, 2004). Second, organizational citizenship behavior can be considered to be an individual's voluntary work beyond the role assigned to him/her in the organization (Bateman & Organ, 1983). Therefore, organizational citizenship behavior can be regarded as subset of pro-social organizational behavior (Cetin et al., 2003).
A large number of factors influencing job satisfaction have been recognized which consist of organizational aspects, job aspects and personal aspects (Sandra, 2012). And the predictors of organizational citizenship behavior mainly include dispositional (i.e., personal characteristics) and situational (i.e., leader-member exchange) factors (Podsakoff et al., 2000). However, there is no research work to investigate SNS addiction influencing job satisfaction and organizational citizenship behavior. Similar to other context, if employees use SNS more in terms of time spent on usage, they are less interested in their real life in workplace, which their job satisfaction decreases and don't have time enough to play their voluntary work beyond the role assigned to them in the organization their roles in workplace, which their organizational citizenship behavior decreases. Accordingly, the following hypothesis is established.
H2: SNS addiction is negatively associated with job satisfaction.
H3: SNS addiction is negatively associated with organizational citizenship behavior.

D. Moderator
In their extensive summary of research on workplace stress, Kahn and Byosiere (1992) concluded that organizational theory and research have been too little concerned with organizational and interpersonal factors that might serve as moderators, buffers, or even as antidotes to stresses and their effects, and that empirical evidence in this area is essentially nonexistent. A few researchers addressed this oversight, primarily by focusing on the potential moderating role of personal factors (e.g., personality characteristics; Burke, Brief & George, 1993) and interpersonal (e.g., family and friends) sources of support (e.g., Fisher, 1985;Ganster, Fusilier & Mayes, 1986;Kaufman & Beehr, 1986). Therefore, this study suggests self-efficacy as a kind of personal factor to relieve stress from job demand arousing SNS addiction.
Self-efficacy may be considered as the way people respond to an external scenario, and relevant responses consist of personal behaviors and efforts that address problems regarding individual objectives (Schwarzer, Boehmer, Luszczynska, Mohamed & Knoll, 2005). People with high self-efficacy are capable of managing personal functions and are inclined to adopt positive problem-focused coping strategies. Therefore, they appear to be less affected by stressful events. By contrast, people with low self-efficacy are inclined to apply negative coping strategies and, therefore, tend to be more affected by stressful events (Bandura, 1997;Luszczynska, Scholz & Schwarzer, 2005;Schwarzer & Jerusalem, 1995). Previous studies have contended that self-efficacy plays a critical role in stress relief (Kreitler, Peleg & Ehrenfeld, 2007;Matsushima & Shiomi, 2003;McCammon, Durham, Allison & Williamson, 1988;Moeini et al., 2008). People with high self-efficacy are less likely to be influenced by extremely stressful scenarios (Heinrichs et al., 2005;Prati, Pietrantoni & Cicognani, 2010;Regehr, Hill & Glancy, 2000;Regehr, Hill, Knott & Sault, 2003). However, neither of these studies examines the possibility that self-efficacy may help to buffer the effects of stress from job demand on SNS addiction. Theoretically, self-efficacy may act to attenuate the positive relationship between the stress from job demand and SNS addiction because people with high self-efficacy are less affected by stressful situations. In other words, self-efficacy may not only help eliminate a certain amount of stress experienced by job demand, but also may buffer the negative effects of stress that cannot be removed due to the nature of the job characteristics. Accordingly, the following hypothesis is established. H4: Self-efficacy decreases the positive relationship between job demand and SNS addiction. Ⅲ . Methodology

A. Sample
The objective of the study was to identify the factors of the organizational behaviors related to SNS addiction based on empirical analysis. Therefore, because the factors of organizational behaviors can be identified by measuring the organization's members' perceptions of workplace situation, we selected the regular workers in Korean companies and surveyed them for this research. The survey research method is very useful in collecting data from a large number of individuals in a relatively short period of time and at better cost. Hence, for the current study, the questionnaire survey was chosen for data collection.

B. Procedure
All participants received a paper-and-pencil questionnaire with an accompanying letter that explained the purpose of the survey, emphasized voluntary participation, and guaranteed confidently. Participants were asked to fill out the questionnaire and put it back into an envelope that was collected by the researcher.
C. Measure Table 1 shows the measurements of variables in our study.

A. Verification of reliability and validity
The validity of variables is verified through the principal components method and factor analysis with the varimax method. The criteria for determining the number of factors is defined as a 1.0 eigen value. We applied factors for analysis only if the factor loading was greater than 0.5 (factor loading represents the correlation scale between a factor and other variables). In the factor analysis, we eliminated two items in the variables of shared vision and system thinking. The reliability of variables is judged by internal consistency as assessed by Cronbach's alpha. We used surveys and regarded each as one measure only if their Cronbach's alpha values were 0.7 or higher.  Table 2 summarizes the Pearson correlation test results between variables and reports the degree of multi-collinearity between independent variables. The minimum tolerance of .827, maximum variance inflation factor of 1.209 show that the statistical significance of the data analysis was not compromised by multi-collinearity.

C. Hypothesis test
To analyze the relationships between job demand and SNS addiction, the results in Table 3, consisting control and independent variables, show that sub-factors of job demand have statistical significances with sub-factors of SNS addiction. Moreover, role ambiguity has positive relationships with immersion (β = .131, p < .01) and association (β = .297, p < .01). Role conflict has a positive relationship with euphoria (β = .222, p < .01). Role overload has a positive relationship with compulsion (β = .152, p < .01). Emotional labor has a positive relationship with immersion (β = .014, p < .01), but has a negative relationship with association (β = -.134, p < .01). Department conflict has a positive relationship with salience (β = .246, p < .01) and compulsion (β = .151, p < .01). This implies that the more job demand people have in the workplace, the stronger their SNS addiction are, which is expected in our hypotheses. However, contrary to our expectation, emotional labor has a negative relationship with association (β = -.134, p < .01). It is shown that the more emotional labor people have, the weaker their association with SNS are.
The results in Table 4 show the effects of sub-factors of SNS addiction on the sub-factors of job satisfaction and organizational citizenship behavior. Salience has a negative effect on colleague satisfaction (β = -.175, p < .01). Compulsion has negative effects on colleague satisfaction (β = -.128, p < .05), supervision satisfaction 3.785 * * 5.625 * * * p < .05, * * p < .01 Table 5. Analysis of the moderating effect of occupational self-efficacy (β = -.179 p < .01) and organizational-oriented OCB (β = -.372, p < .01). Association has negative effects on work satisfaction (β = -.385, p < .01) and individual-oriented OCB (β = -.137, p < .05). This shows that the stronger SNS addiction people have, the weaker their job satisfaction and OCB are, which is expected in our hypotheses. In Table 5, the results, consisting of moderators, shows the interactions between the sub-factors of job demand and occupational self-efficacy. Occupational self-efficacy has a negative effect on the relationship (β = -.196, p < .01) between role ambiguity and immersion, the relationship (β = -.221, p < .01) between role conflict and euphoria, the relationship (β = -.259, p < .01) between role overload and compulsion, the relationship (β = -.128, p < .05) between emotional labor and immersion and the relationship (β = -.199, p < .01) between department conflict and salience, expected in our hypotheses. However, contrary to our expectation, it is shown that occupational self-efficacy has a negative effect on the relationship (β = .141, p < .05) between role ambiguity and association. Based on our results, when people have higher occupational self-efficacy in workplace, job demand has weaker impact on their SNS addiction. However, contrary to our expectation, it is shown that they have higher occupational self-efficacy, role ambiguity have stronger impact on the association with SNS addiction.

A. Summary and implications
This study investigated the impact of job demand level on employees' SNS addiction and how their SNS addiction influences their job satisfaction and OCB. We conducted a data analysis to discover if occupational self-efficacy can moderate the relationship between job demand and SNS addiction. The findings can be summarized as follows. First, each characteristics of job demand such as role ambiguity, role conflict, role overload, emotional labor and department conflict increases each relevant phenomena of SNS addiction. Among the characteristics of job demand, job significance and job diversity are not significantly related to SNS addiction. This implies that although job is important in workplace or requires a variety of roles to employees, they don't commit themselves to SNS world to evade their stress. Because role ambiguity, role conflict, role overload, emotional labor and department conflict arise from interpersonal problem, they can evade these stresses by committing themselves to SNS world. However, the results show that emotional labor decreases their association with SNS are, which is contrary to or expectation. We infer that the reason of this result is due to the characteristics of emotional labor. Emotional labor showed strong, positive associations with emotional exhaustion and depersonalization (Hulsheger & Schewe, 2011). When employee's jobs require great emotional labor, they are not only stressful but also exhausted emotionally and depersonalized seriously. These individual burnout can make them feel no association with SNS world as well as real life.
Second, each phenomena of SNS addiction such as salience, compulsion and association decrease each relevant factors of job satisfaction and OCB. Among the phenomena of SNS addiction, euphoria and immersion are not significantly related to job satisfaction and OCB. This implies that although employees feel euphoria from SNS use or immerse themselves in SNS world, they cannot get any satisfaction related to their job or don't show OCB actively. Because this euphoria is aroused from SNS use, it is not actually relevant to their job and workplace. And their immersion focus only on SNS world, so they don't pay their attention to their job and workplace. And, all phenomena of SNS addiction show no significance with both of pay and promotion satisfaction. Among job satisfactions, because the satisfactions related to work, colleague or supervision are related to intangible things such as situation, atmosphere or psychological state, they can be influenced by psychological states that are aroused from SNS addiction. Moreover, if employee commit themselves excessively to SNS world, they are likely to make any problem or trouble with their job, colleague or supervision. However, because the satisfactions related to pay or promotion are obtained only through tangible rewards, SNS addiction don't influence these satisfactions. Finally, employees' occupational self-efficacy decrease the effect of each characteristics of job demand such as role ambiguity, role conflict, role overload, emotional labor and department conflict on each relevant phenomena of SNS addiction. However, the results show that employees' occupational self-efficacy increase the effect of role ambiguity on their association with SNS. We infer that the reason of this result is due to the characteristics of occupational self-efficacy. Occupational self-efficacy refers to the competence that a person feels concerning his or her ability to successfully fulfill the tasks involved in his or her work (Rigotti, Schyns & Mohr, 2008). If employees have high occupational self-efficacy, they feel that they can fulfill their tasks successfully in the difficult situation such role conflict, role overload, emotional labor and department conflict. Therefore, they overcome the stress from these job demand. However, role ambiguity is not a job demand that they can overcome with high occupational self-efficacy. On the contrary, if employees are in the situation of role ambiguity, they don't have their tasks that they should fulfil successfully. Therefore, because in the situation of role ambiguity, employees with higher occupational self-efficacy feel less associated in their workplace, they are more likely to find other alternatives of association such as an association with SNS world.
This study makes two kinds of research contributions. First, we introduce SNS addiction in the context of work place and investigate organizational behaviors related to it. Our study is the first to empirically verify the antecedents and consequences of SNS addiction in the workplace. Second, we suggest and empirically verify that occupational self-efficacy is a personal factor moderating the relationship between job demand and SNS addiction.
Moreover, our study provides some of managerial implications to corporate executives who try to manage organizational attitude. Because SNS addiction occurs in reality, it is also not ignorable in the context of workplace. And as the competition between the companies become strong, some job requires a lot of job demand and it arouse SNS addiction, which in turn decreases employees' job satisfaction and OCB. Given this situation, corporate executives need to assign jobs by considering the level of job demand and personal factors.

B. Limitations and future research directions
The analysis results based on our interpretation of the questionnaires provided several insights into the relationships between organizational behaviors and SNS addiction. However, we must also acknowledge the following limitations. First, we collected our responses from employees who are working at Korean companies. We can apply this study's methods to data samples in other countries in order to check the constancy of our variables' relationships. Second, as the variables were all measured at the same time, we cannot be sure that their relationships are constant. Although the survey questions occurred in reverse order of the analysis model to prevent additional issues, the existence of causal relationships between variables is a possibility.


extfieldsofstudy: Physics Engineering

text:
New design of cutters for coal mining machines

The author designs an up-to-date rock cutter for mining machines and presents a matrix to determine its service life depending on the strength of the rock being broken. The dependence of the cutter service life on the strength of the rock being broken is proved. Advanced designs of rock cutters by the leading companies are described. The author develops an original design of a rock cutter which provides greater cutting surface, increased strength and prolonged service life. Pilot samples of the cutters ready to the test run are presented.

Introduction
Rocks breaking in mines during the mining and clearing activities is conducted by special coal mining machines; their working bodies are equipped with cutters. The cutters are placed on the coal mining machines in the amount of 38-96 pieces, depending on the design of the executive body (Fig. 1).

Research Results
Currently coal mining machines are equipped with swivel tangential cutter which is designed as a cylinder swing holders made of high strength alloy steel and hard-tipped with hard-metal nose (Fig. 2). The nose is made of strong wear-resistant tungsten-rhenium alloy and is joined to the holder by means of brazing. The efficiency of rock braking depends on the depth and the speed of penetration into the rock, strength and abrasiveness of the rock, cutter wear resistance, a rock breaking technique, mining machine driver's skills and some other factors.
Mechanical characteristics such as rock strength and cutter strength are crucial for effective coal breaking. Both the rock and the cutter can have high, average and low strength. Various combinations of these properties define different rate of reciprocal destruction of the rock and the cutter. Rock cutter wear rate is stipulated by different variations in strength ratio. (Fig.3).
Low strength cutters have limited applications and can be used only with coal and soft rock. Using such cutters with average and high strength rocks leads to quick wear out and inefficient performance. Soft and average strength rocks can be effectively cut by an average strength cutter. When using high strength cutters with strong rocks, their reciprocal impact matches. If a rock becomes softer wear rate of a high strength cutter decreases, which provides wide application field of such cutters.   To reduce the negative influence of rocks on mining machines designers increase power of coal mining machine drives, strengthen assembly units and joint points, change operating device design. Improving rock cutting tools is an important measure to increase efficiency of rock cutting. Leading companies all over the world are concerned in designing new and better cutting tools.
Among the latest innovation by Sandvik company there are ribbed cutter heads to provide easy rotation and uniform wearing [3]. The cutter heads has four ribs longwise (Fig. 5a). Kennametal company adopted cutter heads of similar shape. Cutters U83K 3.1 48,UR118 3.5 12.5NB, AM512FG have longwise ribs on their heads.
Another promising design by Sandvik company is equipped with TriSpecTM carbide ring to protect the area where the nose is fastened to the head body (Fig. 5b) [3]. The ring entrains about the front part of the cutter head where the nose is brazed-in and prevents the steel body from early wearing, thus prolonging service life of the carbide insert. Kennametal company offers a similar design of rings U119HF 80 16 and AM521HF 74 with protecting ring on the head nose.
Some designers suggest using a hard steel insert (for example Х12МФ ) as a cutting element in order to uniform the rate of wearing of cutter body and insert. Work tests of such cutters showed their efficiency and uniform self-sharpening [4]. There are a number of researches aimed at improving design and increasing strength of cutters in various ways [5][6][7][8].
In mines of Kuzbass region some tests have been carried out to study the degree and the pattern of cutters wearing. The tests showed that the upper tapered section of the cutter head undergoes intensive wear. Fig. 6 shows a cutter which has lived its lifespan on KP-21 coal mining machine. We can see that the tapered area of the cutter head is uniformly worn out by 36 %. The rest of the head is not changed except for surface wear as deep as about 1mm.Wear rate (reducing head length) can be estimated with the help of graphs in Fig. 7, where curve 1 shows reducing head length from initial 70mm, and curve 2 shows an aggregate wearing of the head in per cent on a cumulative total.  It has been found out that among other factors accelerated wearing of the tapered part of the cutter head is caused by irregular hardness of the cutter material, which decreases from 55 to 42 HRD on the surface and from 50 to 35 HRC in the center in the direction from the wide part of the head to the tapered one [9].
Based on the study of the rate and the mode of wearing of coal machine cutter we have developed a new design of the cutter which has high wear resistance and efficiency. We suggest reinforcing the head with extra reinforcing elements alongside with providing it with a tampered carbide nose. We recommend using carbide blades brazed in notches along the cutter axis. The length of the blades is 30-35 mm and their thickness is 5 mm. Such design provides a larger cutting surface, higher strength and greater durability. There can be from 2 to 4 brazed-in blades. Fig. 8 shows a photo of new cutters.

Figure 8. Coal machine cutters with heads reinforced by carbide blades
The left cutter has 3 cutting blades, the right one is equipped with two blades. These cutters are innovative and we are currently arranging test runs in the mines of Kuzbass.
Carbide cutting blades improve wear resistance of cutter surface. Table 1 shows calculations of the reinforced area depending on the number of cutting blades per a head (table 1). When 2 -4 blades are inserted, the area protected by hard alloy increases from 4% to 7%. As for working part of the head which undergoes the greatest wearing two inserted blades increase the hardened area by 16%, with three blades this area grows by 24%, and with four blades it grows by 32%. Fig. 9 shows changes in the average hardness of the working part of the head as the number of inserted plates is increased. The graph shows that average hardness can be increased from 55 up to 60 HRC, which significantly raises cutter heads durability. The cutting blades serve not only to harden the holder but also to fasten the nose in the body. They prevent quick wearing of the body around the nose and its early withdrawal. The chosen length of the blades allows their inserting into the wide part of the head which does not undergo great wearing which provides reliable fastening and long service life of the cutting blades.
Increased service life of the cutters allows breaking great volumes of rock. The cost of a unit of mined coal decrease and coal mining efficiency grows.

Conclusion
Coal and rock cutting in modern mines is carried out by means of coal mining machines equipped with tangential cutters. Efficiency of their performance mainly depends on correlation of strength of a cutting metal and that of a rock.
The design of coal machine cutter reinforced by longwise cutting blades suggested in the article provides it with greater cutting surface, increased strength and longer service life. Reinforced area on the working part of the head is increased to 32%, average strength rises to 60HRC. Test samples of this design are ready for testing in the mines of Kusbass. Hardness, HRС


Tracing the Weaknesses of the Regulatory Framework for Clinical Trial in Nigeria

*Corresponding Author Email Address:sisalihu.pcl@buk.edu.ng Recommended citation:Salihu, S.I., Yusof, Y., Rohizan, H. (2015). Tracing the Weaknesses of the Regulatory Framework for Clinical Trial in Nigeria. Journal of Business and Social Review in Emerging Economies, 1 (2) 7788. DOI: https://doi.org/10.26710/jbsee.v1i2.10 Volume and Issues Obtainable at Center for Sustainability Research and Consultancywww.globalcsrc.org Journal of Business and Social Review in Emerging Economies ISSN: 2519-089X; (Online) 2519-0326 Volume 1: Issue 2December 2015

Introduction
It is easier and cheaper for pharmaceutical companies to do their investigation in the developing countries for economic, social, political and legal reasons. Economically the cost is significantly reduced compare to Europe and America to about 60% when compared to other countries, such as United State (Murari, 2012). People in developed countries are zealous about human rights and fear of being harmed. Politically the developed countries create an impression to the world that they are in control of all diseases and the cure. Regrettably, developing countries have a very weak legal system that makes their citizens vulnerable. They prefer to do investigation in the developing world where there is least expensive and less burdensome regulatory environment in order to avoid litigation in case of injury to participants.
The methodology followed to make this research paper is a doctrinal methodology. The available literatures on the issue are examined, particularly international instrument regulating clinical trial and the municipal laws e.g. the constitution and other relevant laws. The Pfizer case in Kano clinical trial was considered as the basis for conducting the research to review the legal framework in order to strengthen it to save more life from the hands of unscrupulous foregn pharmaceutical Companies.
Clinical trials is a study of drugs that are still in development or have not yet been approved by the relevant food and drugs agency for the use being studied, is important considering the need for invention of new drugs for new diseases. European Union (EU) Clinical Trial Directive defines it as, an investigation to ascertain the efficacy or safety of a medicine in human subjects (Idigbe, 2014). The trial is conducted on new drugs to determine whether or not they are safe and effective. So, where the safety of human being is at risk, good and effective framework must be in place to ensure protection, which is why agencies, rules and guidelines are provided to ensure ethical conduct and compliance with good clinical practice, but where there is none or is inadequate all hands must be on desk to provide solutions.
Nigeria like other countries has a National Health Research ethics committee (NREC) which is a national body that advises federal ministry of health in respect of ethical issues regarding clinical research (Devid, 2015). The body is responsible for formulating guideline and standard for conduct of both human and animal research. It also has the task of registering and auditing of Nigeria Health Research Ethics Committees (National Health Act, 2014). Part of its function in 2014 NHREC issued a statement on the use of experimental drugs. During 2014 West Africa Ebola virus outbreak, It noted that bureaucracy and administrative requirement is limiting international shipping of biological samples during the Ebola outbreak (Aminu, et al. 2016).

Conceptual Clarification of Terms
This part intends to clarify some important concepts. Consent or informed consent, is a necessary requirement for any clinical trials involving human subject. It came about since the historical antecedent that happen during the Nazi period with some physician involved in a terrified act of disrespect to human dignity in the name of clinical research. Informed consent is a recognised human right under International Covenanting on Civil and Political Right (United Nation,1996). Clinical Trials involves scientific research or test of medicine before consumption to ensure safety of human being. This is regulated by food and Drugs Administrative bodies in Nigeria and US. National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC) is the body responsible for regulating clinical trials in Nigeria. There is also Health Research Ethics Committee (HREC) established to carry out oversight function in the conduct of the trials (Defazio, 2013). It works under NAFDAC. Clinical research involves Ethical conduct of the health personnel and the researchers themselves to ensure compliance of Morals, legal, political and social issues (Singer, 2008).

Brief History of Clinical Trial in Nigeria
Since the advent of colonialism, a clinical trial was not a new thing in Nigeria. There has been the existence of Rockefeller Foundation which initiated the Rockefeller Foundation Yellow Fever Commission for West Africa, called the Yellow Fever Commission in 1925. It built a research unit in Yaba, Lagos (Nwabueze, 2004). Although it was only the issue of consent that was considered, there was a question of ethics as one of the corner stone in every clinical trial around the world. Britain established in 1954 the West African Council for Medical Research for its colonies, which was serving for the British government as medical research centre for its colonies. The law that established it made no specific provision regarding the kind of research and no mention was made of ethical aspect of it. Thereafter, the University College Hospital was established in Ibadan 1953, twenty years after the Nigeria military government established Medical Research Council of Nigeria (MRC) which was established to conduct medical research in Nigeria (Nwabueze, 2004).
In 1977 the National Science and Technology Development Agency was created and saddled with the responsibility of scientific research and development. Although one may say there was progress regarding the establishment of research centres in Nigeria, but the question was how safe were the participants, was the regulation also progressing to ensure compliance with ethical conduct of research especially where the research subject is a human being?

International Instrument Regulating Clinical Research
International law regulating clinical trials can be traced back to the trial of doctors during Nazi period, popularly known as Nuremberg trial. Where after the Second World War twenty three of Nazi physicians were tried for organising and participating in a war crime and crime against humanity through medical experiment, where victims of war were subjected to turture (Nelson, 2012). Seven out of the Doctors were convicted executed, some were sentenced to term of prison and others were acquitted. This event produced the Nuremberg code in 1949 (Nelson, 2012). The most horrible among the violation of research ethics was freezing experiment to examine for hypothermia and also designed to cause death and posing experiment conducted to test and evaluate the effect of poison in food and bullets. If all these research were done with the informed consent of the participant it will have been a different case all together, although even that the question of disrespecting human dignity would have arose. The code provides about 10 principles required to be observed in any trial. Notable among them is the voluntary consent of the research participant which is the corner stone of any good clinical practice (Dowbiggin, 2013).

Nuremberg Code
The code came during the trial at Nuremberg after World War II was conducted by the International Military Tribunal. Where it provides some basic principles that every clinical trial shall comply with. Nuremberg Code was the first most important document in respect of clinical trial in the world (Evelyn, 1997). Its first principle is research participant should have legal capacity to give consent; they should have free opportunity to exercise free power of choice, without the intervention of any element of force, fraud, deceit, duress, overreaching, or other ulterior form of constraint or coercion; and should have sufficient knowledge and comprehension of the elements of the subject matter involved as to enable him to make an understanding and enlightened decision (Evelyn, 1997). This latter element requires that before the acceptance of an affirmative decision by the experimental subject they should be made known to him the nature, duration, and purpose of the experiment; the method and means by which it is to be conducted; all inconveniences and hazards reasonably to be expected; and the effects upon his health or person which may possibly come from his participation in the experiment (Evelyn, 1997).

Declaration of Helsinki
It is widely believed that Nuremberg left a lot of important issues regarding protection of human subject in a clinical research. Medical researchers created another form of guidelines to set ethical standard (Laughton, 2012). Helsinki Declaration was issued by the world Medical Association. One of the major differences it has with Nuremberg code is that it added the full explanation before a patient gives his consent. It also allowed consent to be given in representation capacity, especially where the patient may not be able to give consent. This is because in the Nuremberg code consent must be given by the patient himself, and that covered cases of children and unconscious adult. In the course of this paper we shall see how it becomes necessary to have consent in a written form and documented, having in mind the notorious case of Pfizer in 1996. Many countries including US adapted and incorporated the declaration into their clinical research regulation (Laughton, 2012). However, it must be noted that the declaration lack any binding principle and there is no procedure for enforcement or any mechanism. One of its major setbacks is that it was considered not universal enough to establish a claim under Alien Tort Claim Act in the United State (Abdullahi, 2009).

Council for International Organisation of Medical Science (CIOMS)
This council collaborating with the World Health Organisation (WHO) published its international ethics for biomedical research involving human subjects. This guideline is more specific and practical guidance concerning the Helsinki principles. In guideline 5 it provides for an elaborate condition to be satisfied before consent is considered valid (Council for International Organizations of Medical Sciences, 2002). That before requesting an individual's consent to participate in research, the investigator must provide information, in a language or another communication that the individual can understand: that he participate by limitation and he has the right to refuse the invitation and if at any time agrees to be part of the research he can withdraw at any time, these and many other conditions shall be fulfilled (Council for International Organizations of Medical Sciences, 2002) The Nuremberg Code and the international Covenant on Civil and Political Right (CCPR) that talked about consent make no distinction regarding therapeutic and non therapeutic research, which by necessary implication means all require the need for consent. Although in therapeutic research there may be conflict of interest between the patient and the need to protect the larger society, the disease has to be cured for the larger public to be safe and that will be a necessity for the research. This fundamental deficiency means that therapeutic research have largely been ignored by the medical profession. By necessary implication Article 1 of the Code and Article 7 of CCPR (both addressing consent) would mean that consent would be necessary in both therapeutic and non therapeutic research. Another implication is that victims of accident who are unconscious or those who are mentally impaired cannot if no treatment available be subjected to new therapeutic measure that may save their lives. If this interpretation shall be upheld, it has the implication of excluding other victims these laws aim to protect.
The international framework is unable to solve the problems that exist within the biomedical fields of research. These Codes and Declarations, by their very nature, are non-binding instruments that guide the conduct of research, but they are useful in guiding state parties to promulgate a law to ensure protection of ethical violation. Pharmaceutical companies take advantage of this fact, some have asserted that part of the problem is not that there is too little international standard setting but that there is too much of it (Murari, 2012). But because they are not binding instrument, they cannot be enforced against physicians or the pharmaceutical companies. However, it is opined that issues arising in clinical trials are not limited to ethical concerns, but into the realm of international human rights law (Murari, 2012).

Legal Framework for Clinical Research in Nigeria
Every legislation, rule or regulation, is protecting, restricting an exercise of a defined right or violating the said right. Therefore, since these rights are enshrined in the constitution, any other law limiting or restricting its exercise must be in tune with the constitution. For example, people have rights to engage in all commercial activities like, buying and selling of drugs is a legitimate business which must not be left unregulated. So regulating it is a democratically justifiable law in Nigeria. The law regulating it has its roots from the constitution as a ground norm.(Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999) Particularly is within the personal liberty of an individual to consent to be a participant in a research or not.
National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC) is the principal regulatory body established by law (National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control Act, 2004). Although the main function of the Agency is regulating food and controlling drugs administration in Nigeria, the Agency also takes charge of regulating clinical trials by ensuring compliance with standard and to provide procedure and regulation for the trials. With a critical perusal of the functions of NAFDAC as provided under section 5, clinical trial is not an important segment of the agency. The agency dwell more on foods and drugs administration rather than clinical trial for drugs to ensure compliance with ethical standard in the process (Idigbe, 2014). The provision conferring the power to regulate food and drugs is too general and short of clarity. Although drugs legislation can cover either laws dealing with drugs specifically or cover both drugs and other substances, like cosmetics, food and beverages etc. (Jayasuriya, 1985) NAFDAC Act chooses to cover both, but without giving importance to clinical trial especially where human being is the subjects. Providing the authority is not enough. The powers and the functions must be clearly spelt out to avoid ambiguity. Good legal framework works to lessen casualties in a trial.
Drugs labelling regulation (Erhun Babalola & Erhun, 2001) provides that all tablets, capsule, caplet and similar on dosage form shall bear identification marks traceable to the manufacturer of holder of a certificate of registration of the product unless otherwise exempted by NAFDAC for the purpose of clinical trial investigation or bioequivalent studies. Drugs and Related Products (Registration) Decree No. 19 of 1993. These laws make provisions for the prohibition of the manufacture, importation, exportation, advertisement, sale or distribution of drugs, drug products, cosmetics or medical devices unless it has been registered in accordance with the provisions of the decree. It also stipulates the procedure for applying for registration of a drug product, conditions under which information supplied by an applicant is disclosed, and provisions for the suspension or cancellation of certificates of registration and clinical trials. Penalties for contravention of provisions of this decree are also stipulated therein. Lack of over sight function and regulatory framework put the society at risk in conducting clinical trial and research. People in Nigeria do not enjoy the right and protection enjoy by people in Europe and US (Postal & Diaz, 2012). These laws are not adequate in protecting human subject in a clinical research.

In exercise of its powers under section 5 and 29,(National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control Act, 2004) NAFDAC issued Good Clinical Practice Regulation 2009 (Good Clinical Practice Regulations 2009).
The regulation prescribed the requirement of good clinical trials in conducting clinical trials including multi-centre trials to ensure rights, safety and well-being of trial participants are protected and make the result of the trial credible. The rules provide for conditions to be satisfied before a trial can be acceptable, that is to say that ethics committee must give a favorable opinion about the trial prior to submission of an application to NAFDAC. And NAFDAC shall give authorization for the conduct of the trial. The regulation prohibits the use of human as trial participant save under exceptional cases (Good Clinical Practice Regulations 2009). One of the basic requirements is informed consent of the participant or the participant authorized representative. The regulation is a carbon copy of the Helsinki Declaration which has international recognition although with no binding principle.
Recently National Health Act was signed into law on October 31, 2014. The NH Act aimed at establishing a framework for the regulation, development and management of a national health system and Setting standards for rendering healthcare services in Nigeria. The Act provides for the establishment of a National Health Research Committee, with members to be appointed by the minister on recommendation of Health Research Institutions and related bodies in Nigeria. It is expected to promote health research by public and private health authorities and give health research agenda and resources problem focus and priority. Most importantly, Research on living persons must be conducted in accordance with guidelines from relevant authorities (Cohen-Almagor, 2011). It must be complied with international standard, like written informed consent, if on minors, and only when it is in the best interest of the minor, or with the written informed consent of the parent or guardian. It also has the power to determine guidelines to be followed by health research ethics committees (HRECs): Set standards for conducting research on humans and animals including clinical trials. Determine the extent of health research to be carried out by health authorities (Cohen-Almagor, 2011).
It is mandatory that every clinical trial must comply with international ethics and scientific quality standard for designing, conducting and reporting trials that involve human participation. This is known as Good Clinical Practice (GCP) (Good Cliical Practice Regulatios 2005). Every country should have a good clinical practice standard. A guideline shall be provided to ensure compliance with Good Clinical practice regulation. NAFDAC issued a good clinical practice guideline in 2005 to ensure and maintain standard. If the guideline is complied with, the public shall be safe from injury resulting from clinical trial. 1 However lack of monitoring and enforcement mechanisms make the guideline ineffective, although the guidelines described the responsibilities and expectations of all participants in the conduct of clinical trials, including investigators, monitors, sponsors and ethics committees.

The National Health Research Ethics Committee (NHREC)
The National Health Research Ethics Committee (NHREC) came into existence since October 2005 in order to strengthen mechanism that will ensure the protection of Nigerians participating in clinical research. The committee emanated from Health Research Ethics Committee which had been in existence since early 1980's, and had been able to come up with the National Code of Health Research Ethics (Famuyiwa, 2014).
The committee is to: (a) Set norms and standards for conducting research on humans and animals, including clinical trials among others; Adjudicate in grievances arising from the functioning of health research ethics committees and listen to any complaint of discrimination by any of the health research committees against a researcher; Refer to the relevant statutory health professional council, matters involving the violation or potential violation of an ethical or professional rule by a health care provider; Recommend disciplinary action as may be prescribed by law or permissible by law to the appropriate body against any person in deterrence or violation of any norms and standards, or guidelines, set for the conduct of research under this Act; and Appropriately advise the Federal Ministry of Health and State Ministries of Health on any ethical issues concerning research on health.
Before the establishment of National Code of Health Research Ethics in Nigeria, each institution has health research ethics committee based on international guidelines. Lack of uniformity will be seen as one of the problem. There was also no coordinating and legally binding enforcement mechanism. That is why research involving human is conducted in Nigeria without checks and proper scrutiny. In addition, there was no systematic and sustained development of a culture of ethical health research in national institutions. This is true because the notorious Pfizer case in Kano is illustrative. Investigation has shown that the document presented by Pfizer to go on with the research was forged (Abdullah, 2009). No penalty to serve as deterrent, even where one is provided is inadequate. for example, Where research is conducted with foreign funds, the only penalty in case of non-compliance with ethical standards was to extenuate such funding and extirpate such deterrent researchers from future funding from the same sources, but that did not translate to annihilation of funds from other research funds, and this coupled with absence of domestic legal regulation of ethical research. Above all, the difficulty of having a successful enforcement of ethical standards through litigation, partly because of weak judicial systems, the absence of enabling laws, and unenforceability of international guidelines such as the Nuremberg Code, Belmont principles, Helsinki Declaration, and Council for International Organization of Medical Sciences (CIOMS) guidelines. They are all described as non-legally binding declarative statements that lack the specificity required for legal action, they are therefore not legally enforceable and their contravention in developing countries carries minimal risk to researchers, these aforementioned were then the cause of breach of ethical researches in Nigeria (Abdullah, 2009).

Identifying the Weaknesses
The regulatory framework for clinical trials available in Nigeria is inadequate to protect human subjects. It is obvious this is the reason why developing countries like Nigeria become centre of clinical research. Ethical issues in the course of the trials are not given the required attention. None of the regulatory laws and instruments provides a remedy for victims or research participants. And where research participants wish to seek for remedy in court under common law, the rigorous procedure and difficulties in facing an international pharmaceutical company are enough challenges (Salihu, 2015).
Looking at the framework in other jurisdictions like US, it will do good for the Nigerian legal framework to be revisited. In US there is Food and Drugs Administration (FDA) as a body responsible for regulating clinical trials. It has the power to receive and consider any application for clinical research. FDA in collaboration with department of Health and Human Service (DHHS) adopted the so-called "Common Rule" with the aim of protecting human subject, apart from this law there are other laws, like Pediatric Research Equity Act 2003. It has also made a rule that all clinical trials conducted to secure FDA making authorization must adhere to 21 CFR part 50 and 56 which are regulation designed to project the right of human subject. The rules require protection of human subject who participate in clinical trial. FDA provides further guidance known as Informed Consent, ICH Good clinical practice (GCP). There is also an Institution Review Board. This is a clear evidence that Nigerian regulatory framework is weak, although US has gone far in term of both political and economic advancement, is not an excuse not to protect its citizens from any human right violation through clinical trial.
Therefore it is the suggestion of this writer that leave shall be borrowed from other jurisdiction to improve the situation.

Conclusion
The effort of the international community to protect human subject in a clinical trial has not yielded much result. The instruments are not enforceable. They are voluntary by their nature and they did not form part of customary international law to be enforceable under Alien Tort Claim Act. There has to be legislation in the US to recognise ICCPR and or Nuremberg Code as part of international law under Alien Tort Claim Act since Supreme Court and circuit court refused to do so. At the level of state the legal framework needs to be improved to protect human subject more. It is the suggestion of this writer that a suitable forum has to be established either by United Nation Enforcement Council or an independent tribunal and the council must recognise or accept corporations as legal persons in order to prosecute them. It is the government responsibility under international law to protect its citizens, therefore government has to stop considering the benefit it will get from foreign researchers and concentrate on the protection of its citizens. For Nigeria at least even if a separate body shall not be established for this purpose alone, there shall be mechanism for the enforcement of violation of the available rules.