University of Jordan

About: University of Jordan is a education organization based out in Amman, Jordan. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Medicine. The organization has 7796 authors who have published 13764 publications receiving 213526 citations.

Mining Educational Data to Predict Student’s academic Performance using Ensemble Methods

Abstract: Educational data mining has received considerable attention in the last few years. Many data mining techniques are proposed to extract the hidden knowledge from educational data. The extracted knowledge helps the institutions to improve their teaching methods and learning process. All these improvements lead to enhance the performance of the students and the overall educational outputs. In this paper, we propose a new student’s performance prediction model based on data mining techniques with new data attributes/features, which are called student’s behavioral features. These type of features are related to the learner’s interactivity with the e-learning management system. The performance of student’s predictive model is evaluated by set of classifiers, namely; Artificial Neural Network, Naive Bayesian and Decision tree. In addition, we applied ensemble methods to improve the performance of these classifiers. We used Bagging, Boosting and Random Forest (RF), which are the common ensemble methods used in the literature. The obtained results reveal that there is a strong relationship between learner’s behaviors and their academic achievement. The accuracy of the proposed model using behavioral features achieved up to 22.1% improvement comparing to the results when removing such features and it achieved up to 25.8% accuracy improvement using ensemble methods. By testing the model using newcomer students, the achieved accuracy is more than 80%. This result proves the reliability of the proposed model.

Psychological consequences of COVID-19 home confinement: The ECLB-COVID19 multicenter study.

Abstract: BACKGROUND: Public health recommendations and government measures during the COVID-19 pandemic have enforced restrictions on daily-living. While these measures are imperative to abate the spreading of COVID-19, the impact of these restrictions on mental health and emotional wellbeing is undefined. Therefore, an international online survey (ECLB-COVID19) was launched on April 6, 2020 in seven languages to elucidate the impact of COVID-19 restrictions on mental health and emotional wellbeing. METHODS: The ECLB-COVID19 electronic survey was designed by a steering group of multidisciplinary scientists, following a structured review of the literature. The survey was uploaded and shared on the Google online-survey-platform and was promoted by thirty-five research organizations from Europe, North-Africa, Western-Asia and the Americas. All participants were asked for their mental wellbeing (SWEMWS) and depressive symptoms (SMFQ) with regard to "during" and "before" home confinement. RESULTS: Analysis was conducted on the first 1047 replies (54% women) from Asia (36%), Africa (40%), Europe (21%) and other (3%). The COVID-19 home confinement had a negative effect on both mental-wellbeing and on mood and feelings. Specifically, a significant decrease (p < .001 and Δ% = 9.4%) in total score of the SWEMWS questionnaire was noted. More individuals (+12.89%) reported a low mental wellbeing "during" compared to "before" home confinement. Furthermore, results from the mood and feelings questionnaire showed a significant increase by 44.9% (p < .001) in SMFQ total score with more people (+10%) showing depressive symptoms "during" compared to "before" home confinement. CONCLUSION: The ECLB-COVID19 survey revealed an increased psychosocial strain triggered by the home confinement. To mitigate this high risk of mental disorders and to foster an Active and Healthy Confinement Lifestyle (AHCL), a crisis-oriented interdisciplinary intervention is urgently needed.

Chemo-preventive and therapeutic effect of the dietary flavonoid kaempferol: A comprehensive review

Abstract: Kaempferol, a natural flavonoid present in several plants, possesses a wide range of therapeutic properties such as antioxidant, anticancer, and anti-inflammatory. It has a significant role in reducing cancer and can act as a therapeutic agent in the treatment of diseases and ailments such as diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular diseases, oxidative stress, asthma, and microbial contamination disorders. Kaempferol acts through different mechanisms: It induces apoptosis (HeLa cervical cancer cells), decreases cell viability (G2/M phase), downregulates phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K)/AKT (protein kinase B) and human T-cell leukemia/lymphoma virus-I (HTLV-I) signaling pathways, suppresses protein expression of epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT)-related markers including N-cadherin, E-cadherin, Slug, and Snail, and metastasis-related markers such as matrix metallopeptidase 2 (MMP-2). Accordingly, the aim of the present review is to collect information pertaining to the effective role of kaempferol against various degenerative disorders, summarize the antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anticancer, antidiabetic, and antiaging effects of kaempferol and to review the progress of recent research and available data on kaempferol as a protective and chemotherapeutic agent against several ailments.

Self-medication patterns in Amman, Jordan.

Abstract: The classification of medicine as Prescription-Only-Medicine (POM) and Over-The-Counter (OTC) drugs in Jordan is present but not yet enforced on community pharmacies, the fact that allows access of the public to a wider range of medications that otherwise are provided only on prescription. This, of course, has its implications on safety and effectiveness of the pharmacotherapy in question. This research aims to establish a baseline data concerning the extent of self-medication among Jordanians, and to assess possible factors associated with self-medication, so that future interventions can be documented and planned. A total of 155 out of Amman's 900 community pharmacies. A cross-sectional observational study using a pre-piloted questionnaire was conducted. Over 800 customers who visited the pharmacies over a period of 4 months were interviewed and their non-prescription drug requests patterns were recorded to assess the prevalence of self-medication and offered justification. Self-medication was a common practice among Jordanians (42.5%). The variable that was associated with extent of self-medication was respondents' age, where patients younger than 16 years and those older than 60 years were less likely to self-treat. The most common reasons for self-medication were that the ailments were too minor to see a doctor (46.4%), the long waiting time to be seen by doctors (37.7%) and avoiding the cost of doctors' visits (31.4%). People tended to select medication based on advice received from pharmacy staff (14.2%), friends/neighbors (17.6%) or informal advice from other health professionals like dentists and nurses (21.9%). Alternatively, patients selected products based on their previous experiences with similar symptoms (27%) or similar diseases (33.5%). Self-medication is a common health care practice in Jordan, where people are becoming increasingly familiar with drugs and their brand names. Self-medication behavior varied significantly with a number of socio-economic factors. Unfortunately, only a small percentage of patients engaged pharmacy personnel in therapeutic consultations beyond briefly mentioning a symptom.