Review data relevant to the distinction between early-selection and late selection in models of attention Essay Example

Review data relevant to the distinction between early Review data relevant to the distinction between early-selection and late selection in models of attention Paper Review data relevant to the distinction between early-selection and late selection in models of attention Paper Attention is the ability to take a hold of the mind and select one from many simultaneous objects or thoughts, discarding some things in order to deal with others more effectively (James,1890, as cited in Norman, 1976) . In every day life there are so many things that can be attended to and so certain aspects have to be selected over others. Some tasks that are carried out require very little attention and others require less the more time that they are practiced. All sensory information that is received requires some cognitive processing however with attention, cognitive processing needs to be continuous in order to keep focus and concentration. Attention is something that could be said to be limited, as cognitive processing cannot occur for all stimuli at the same time. It also is selective as the mental energy required for attention can be expanded as the person sees fit. Attention is an issue that has been debated upon for many years. Early-selection models have looked at selection as a limited process that requires selective attention in order to proceed. The selective attention occurs after a basic analysis of the physical features that are used to tell the difference between selected and non-selected stimuli. As a result of this, the unattended stimulus is not completely perceived. Late selection models however discard this idea and assume that perception is unlimited and that attention can be performed in parallel without a need for selection. Lavie and Tsal, 1994) Both the late selection models and early selection models differ in their concepts of how people attend to things and it was only until a compromise model was put forward by Lavie and colleagues that both models were combined to form the perceptual load framework. The idea of how we attend to more than one thing at a time has always been an issue. Colin Cherry (1953, as cited in Eysenck and Keane, 2001) looked at this idea when at a party he was fas cinated with how people were able to follow just one conversation when there are many other conversations taking place around. He called this idea the cocktail party effect, and put it down to physical differences, like gender, speaker location and voice intensity. Cherry carried out a number experiments on this idea and did this by presenting subjects with two different messages at the same time, one in each ear. Cherry found that when the messages were of the same voice then the listener was unable to distinguish between either of the two different messages. Cherry then carried out studies in which he asked the listeners to shadow one of the two messages heard. He found that the listeners could extract very little information from the non-shadowed message, and barely noticed when the non-shadowed message changed language or was even read backwards. Moray (1959, as cited in Kahneman, 1973) tried to look at how much information a subject could remember in the rejected auditory channel and so repeated an english word 35 times in one of the ears. He found that even though the subjects had heard the word many times, many of them still could not retain what it was. Cherry concluded from his work that unattended information receives hardly any processing, which follows the early selection model ideas that attention is not processed in parallel. Broadbent (1958, as cited in Eysenck and Keane, 2001) developed Cherrys ideas further by conducting an experiment on participants in which he presented them with two sets of numbers in each ear. For example the number 354 was presented in one ear at the same time as the number 692 was presented in the other ear. Broadbent found that participants recalled the numbers ear by ear rather than as a whole number, for example 354692 instead of 365942. Broadbent explained his findings by saying that both the inputs are presented in parallel fashion until they reach a buffer where one input is allowed to pass through and the other remains for later processing. This he explained is to prevent an overload. From his discovery Broadbent went on to construct a model from which he felt best described how attention is processed. This model was called the filter model. The filter model put forward the idea that the ability to analyse and identify information is limited. He argued that when information reaches the brain it filters out desired messages and rejects everything else, therefore blocking undesired inputs and preventing an overload on the perceptual system. (Dittrich, 2004) When information is presented it is analysed based upon its physical characteristics. The information is then simultaneously stored in separate channels in the sensory register and the filter switches between channels passing the information stored there, one channel at a time, to the detection device. If the message coming in doesnt have these characteristics then it is filtered out. Broadbents ideas were the beginning of many years of further research. This begun with a referral back to Cherrys questioning of how people can switch their attention from one input to another when they are unaware of the content within the unselected input. Gray and Wedderburn (1960 as cited in Kahneman, 1973) looked at this and ignored Broadbents idea that attention was the basis of an analysis of physical characteristics. They believed that psychological aspects played an important part and so carried out experiments to try and prove their theory. The experiment involved presenting subjects with words broken down into syllables. Each syllable was presented alternately to each ear. At the same time another word was broken down the same way and was presented to the complimentary ear. Gray and Wedderburn found that words could be constructed and were not repeated as just a mixture of different syllables. This suggested that meaning of information can be constructed from both ears and it is not just physical characteristics like Broadbent had previously said. Continuing from the work of Cherry and Broadbent, Treisman (1960) discovered that in experiments where a participant had to shadow a word, they sometimes repeated a word that had been presented to the unattended ear. This was known as a breakthrough(Dittrich, 2004). Treisman carried out a series of experiments and found that on the cases where this did occur the majority of the time the word was related to the context of the words being presented to the attended ear. Findings from this led to Treisman proposing a new filter theory in 1968. The filter rejected the idea of Broadbents all or none filter idea and suggested that attention is processed in a more flexible manner. Treisman noticed that a difference in voice and language played an important part in experiments involving participants to select a response to one of two messages ( Norman, 1976). It seems that differences occur depending on what language the second message is spoken in. For example if the language is of similar phonetic structure to that of English then it is less distracting than if the language was something like Czech. Also if the subject has previous knowledge of a language then this will be more distracting than hearing a language that they have never heard before. Overall Treisman concluded that it is unlikely that both messages are fully analysed and so selection of one message takes place over the other This selection takes place starting with an analysis of the messages physical features, then goes on to look at words and meaning. Triesman said that selection of messages that have the same voice, intensity and localization takes place during the analysis rather than after it. It is at this stage that the information-handling capacity becomes limited and so to prevent overloading the irrelevant message is either discarded or both messages are kept and alternation takes place between each one. The decision to which message is kept or whether both are alternated is based on physical characteristics and grammatical features. This is why people are sometimes able to anticipate what words are about to occur when speaking to someone about a particular subject. It is also why that information from competing messages is sometimes picked out when the information being heard is similar to that in which is being primarily attended. Deutsch and Deutsch (1963, as cited in Eysenck and Keane, 2001, Norman, 1976) come up with a theory, which is known more as a late selection model. According to Deutsch and Deutsch all information is processed in full when it enters the consciousness and that it will reach the same perceptual and discriminatory mechanisms whether attention is paid to it or not. They believed that sensory stimulus does not affect what we attend to but each central structure has different levels of importance. For example, our own name makes us attend more or distracts us more easily from a primary source than any random word. Deutsch and Deutsch disregarded Triesmans and Broadbents early filter theories and put forward the idea that even if a signal is on a channel in which another signal is already being attended it still can be detected. They also suggested that all inputs are recognized in parallel, and that the role of attention is to select which items get placed in short term memory. There is a lack of evidence supporting Deutsch and Deutschs theory and competing theorists have provided evidence against the idea that all information is processed in full. For example Treisman and Geffen (1967) asked participants to shadow one of two auditory messages and tap when they heard a target word in either of the messages. Results found that detection of the target word was much higher in the shadowed message than the non-shadowed message disregarding Deutsch and Deutschs claim that there should be no difference in the detection rate. Lavie et al (1994) took the ideas of both the early and late selection models and came up with a compromise of the two; this model was called the perceptual load framework. Lavie et al proposed that although physical differences play an important part in selective attention, irrelevant information is only discarded when the perceptual load of relevant information is too high to make use of the available resources. Therefore Lavie et al argues that tasks have different levels of attentional capacity and that upper limits are imposed at different levels dependent on a persons temporal state of alertness, availability of resources and the subject-task structural constraints. Navon and Gopher (1979 as cited in Lavie and Tsal, 1994) came up with a rule that states the amount of resources that can be applied to a task. They said that resources will be supplied to meet the internal demand and that these resources will either equal the demand or reach the limit of the available resources. Lavie et als approach mixes both the early and late selection processes by looking at the distinction between high and low perceptual loads. A perceptual load is the number of units in a display and the type of processing that is needed for each unit. It seems that the results that support early selection models have been gained when the conditions have been of high perceptual load whereas results supporting late selection have been gained under conditions of low perceptual load. As well as all of this Lavie et al still takes into consideration the differences between the physical characteristics of attended and unattended information. An experiment carried out by Stroop (1935 as cited in Lavie and Tsal, 1993) shows that there is a poor physical distinction between relevant and irrelevant stimuli when they both occupy the same location. This was shown in an experiment in which subjects had to identify the colour of a word. Results found that subjects processed the meaning of the word and that reaction time increased in relation to the baseline of response time to recognising a colour patch or the colour of a non-colour word when the word was a colour name and printed in a different colour. The stroop effect therefore was said to show that one stimuli affects another more one way, than if the two stimuli were to be reversed. For example naming a colour doesnt usually affect word reading, but word reading can affect colour naming. This indicates that the stoop affect is an example of the difference in parallel processing between relevant and irrelevant stimuli, which shows why there is a difference in response times between some stimuli compared to others. In all this approach looks at perceptual load being of a low level and generally supports late selection models as it takes upon the idea that attention is a process that can be carried out in parallel. Looking at evidence supporting early selection models however takes into consideration high perceptual loads. Pashler (1984, as cited in Lavie and Tsal, 1994) devised a variation of the bar-probe technique (Averbach Coriell, 1961). This involved using eight different items shown on a display with three stimulus onset asynchronies being shown between each stimulus and the probe. Subjects had to match each of the four shapes with the location, which resulted in the subjects creating eight different combinations. Pashler found that physical differences increased the time it took the participant to identify each shape to the location, even when the probe came 300 msec before the display. This therefore questions the late selection models as it shows that selection happens at the perceptual stage. In conclusion it seems that there is evidence supporting both models of early and late selection and that attention is something that varies dependent on a combination of both ideas. Although Broadbent (1958) and his filter theory initially put forward the idea that attention is a selective process, it does seem from later research that in some cases people are able to attend to more than one thing at a time. Treisman (1960) developed Broadbents idea and extended his filter theory by suggesting that physical differences play an important role in determining which message to keep or discarded. Treisman believed that selection takes place before analysis rather than after it and that both messages can be kept but alternation has to take place to prevent an overload. A late selection model proposed by Deutsch and Deutsch (1963) disagreed with that of early selection models in that they believed that all information is processed in full when it enters the consciousness. Deutsch and Deutsch said that even when multiple messages are on the same channel they can still be processed in parallel with the most important being kept and the other being stored in the short-term memory. Comparisons of the early and late selection models finally resulted in both being examined in an equal manner, eventually leading to the perceptual framework model being proposed by Lavie and colleagues (1994). This model supported both selection models by linking it to whether a perceptual load was high or whether it was low. Overall it seems that attention is wholly down to an analysis of physical properties, which is then given further analysis to determine what things are paid attention to and what things are not.

Can a President Pardon Himself - Constitution and Laws

Can a President Pardon Himself - Constitution and Laws The question of whether a president can pardon himself arose during the 2016 presidential campaign when critics of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton suggested she could face criminal prosecution or impeachment over her use of a private email server as secretary of the Department of State if she were to be elected. The topic also surfaced during the tumultuous presidency of Donald Trump, particularly after it was reported that the erratic businessman and former reality-television star and his lawyers  were discussing the president’s authority to grant pardons and that Trump was asking his advisers about his power to pardon aides, family members and even himself. Trump further stoked speculation that he was considering his power to pardon himself amid the ongoing probes over his campaigns connections with Russia when he tweeted all agree the U.S. President has the complete power to pardon.† Whether a president has the power to pardon himself, though, is unclear and the subject of much debate among constitutional scholars. The first thing you should know is this: No president in the history of the United States has ever pardoned himself. The Power to Pardon in the Constitution Presidents are granted the authority to issue pardons in Article II, Section 2, Clause 1 of the U.S. Constitution.   The clause reads: The President ... shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment. Take note of two key phrases in that clause. The first keyphrase limits the use of pardons for offenses against the United States. The second key phrase states that a president cant issue a pardon in cases of impeachment. Those two caveats in the Constitution place some limitations on the presidents power to pardon. The bottom line is that if a president commits a high crime or misdemeanor and is impeached, he cant pardon himself. He also cannot pardon himself in private civil and state criminal cases. His authority extends only to federal charges. Take note of the word grant. Typically, the word means one person gives something to another. Under that meaning, a president can give someone else a pardon, but not himself. Yes, the President Can Pardon Himself Some scholars argue that the president can pardon himself in some circumstances because - and this is a key point - the Constitution does not explicitly prohibit it. That is considered by some to be the strongest argument that a president has the authority to pardon himself. In 1974, as President Richard M. Nixon was facing certain impeachment, he explored the idea of issuing a pardon to himself and then resigning. Nixons lawyers prepared a memo stating such a move would be legal. The president decided against a pardon, which would have been politically disastrous, but resigned anyway. He was later pardoned by President Gerald Ford. Although I respected the tenet that no man should be above the law, public policy demanded that I put Nixon-and Watergate-behind us as quickly as possible, Ford said. In addition, the U.S Supreme Court has ruled that a president can issue pardon even before charges have been filed. The high court stated that pardon power â€Å"extends to every offense known to the law, and may be exercised at any time after its commission, either before legal proceedings are taken or during their pendency, or after conviction and judgment.† No, the President Cant Pardon Himself Most scholars argue, however, that presidents cannot pardon themselves. More to the point, even if they were, such a move would be incredibly risky and likely to ignite a constitutional crisis in the United States. Jonathan Turley,  a professor of public interest law at George Washington University, wrote in The Washington Post: Such an act would make the White House look like the Bada Bing Club. After a self-pardon, Trump could wipe out the Islamic State, trigger an economic golden age and solve global warming with a carbon-eating border wall - and no one would notice. He would simply go down in history as the man who not only pardoned his family members but himself.​ Michigan State University law professor Brian C. Kalt, writing in his 1997 paper Pardon Me: The Constitutional Case Against Presidential Self-Pardons, stated that a presidential self-pardon would not hold up in court. An attempted self-pardon would likely undermine the publics confidence in the presidency and the Constitution. A potential meltdown of such magnitude would be no time to begin legalistic discussion; the political facts of the moment would distort our considered legal judgment. Looking at the question from a cooler vantage point, the intent of the Framers, the words and themes of the Constitution they created, and the wisdom of the judges that have interpreted it all point to the same conclusion: Presidents cannot pardon themselves. The courts would likely follow the principle  stated by James Madison in the Federalist Papers. No man, Madison wrote, is allowed to be a judge in his own cause, because his interest would certainly bias his judgment, and, not improbably, corrupt his integrity.

Country Analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Country Analysis - Essay Example Leaders who are charismatic are perceived to have a strong impact on their fan base or followers (Sotik et al 2002). Such leaders show dominance, self confidence and extraversion. They employ emotional appeals instead of authority (Yulk 2006) to elicit obedience from followers. Thinking of France, this form of leadership has been adapted very well. Despite the French being collective, they were not ready to be subjected to authority. Moreover, France tends to deject coercion into altering their ways. Such conditions are always needed from followers inspired by transformational leadership (Strang 2005). In contrary, French followers are likely to be influenced by a leader who is charismatic as they have a feeling of obedience to him. This appeals to the French as they believe in free will and the right to do whatever they want (laizzes faire). The similarity between the value of followers and vision in a charismatic leader and followers’ conception show why the style is effective in France. The style is relevant to charismatic leadership but direct approach in this style makes the difference. The literature implied transformational leadership made the followers loyal, trust and admire and have respect for the leaders while the followers had the motivation to extend beyond expectation. In other studies, there was a suggestion that transformational leadership changed and followers be induced by giving them instructions on criticality of objectives to attain. Therefore, the leaders made followers to be impelled to give up their aspirations for team’s or organization’s benefit. In his previous works, Yulk (2006) stated that contingencies in which transformational style was probable to spring was in an unstable and dynamic environment, a friendly and flexible one to innovation. Nevertheless, the French never considered innovation friendliness to be a

Finance Literature review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Finance - Literature review Example he larger it grows, the management therefore has an important decision to make on whether to pay the shareholders their dividends presently or hold onto the money and make a payment of an increased amount. Besides the two, a firm may opt to pay its shareholders in terms of stock dividends; this unlike cash does not offer liquidity but ensures capital gains by the investors. These and many other issues related to the payment of dividends make dividend policies of significant relevance to the management of the firm. For example, the expectation of the dividends by the shareholders, aid determines the value of the firm’s shares. Firms can choose from a number of dividend policy forms and theories to use in the management of their dividends. However, the choice depends on a number of factors key among which is the capital size of the firm (Stickney, 2010). Smaller companies may not have the financial advantage to pay hefty dividends to its shareholders yet still stay operational; they therefore require those policies that consider its market share and the overall level of the return on investment. Additionally, the market factors all of which in a way affect the business operations of the firm must also have adequate consideration before the payment of dividends. This explains the every fluctuating amount paid to shareholders after every financial p eriod. In a summary, dividend arises from the profits made in every financial period. After operating, the firm determines its profit, which is often after deducting the cost of conducting business and that of maintaining the business (Dyck & Neubert, 2010). The firm therefore divides the resulting amount to the shareholders based on the amount of shares each possesses. However, the investors do not share the losses of the company. It is therefore obvious that every operational factor in the market that affects the profitability of the firm directly affects the resultant dividend value and subsequently the share value.

An Investigation into Essay Example for Free

An Investigation into Essay However, if the reading on the ammeter or voltmeter was not taken quickly, the temperature may have risen, and therefore the resistance of the wire would have increased too. This would mean that the results would not be totally accurate, as the experiments would not be fair. 2. There may have been some problems with the equipment that would help explain possible anomalies other than human error. For example, the wire used may not be pure, and the equipment was not totally accurate, due to frequent use, and the fact that it was built and maintained to a poor standard. 3. As different lengths of wire needed to be used, I cut separate lengths of Constantan wire, instead of using the same section of wire and varying the points at which the crocodile was connected. It is probable that each separate section of wire had different amounts of impurities in them, and therefore the readings will not be entirely accurate. 4. Some of the anomalies will have been caused by human error in the measuring of the wire. This is because it is not very practical to hold a piece of wire straight and cut it perfectly at the designated length. The crocodile clips will also have not been placed exactly at the specific length, and so the actual length of the wire in the circuits will vary from the length recorded. 5. The crocodile clips used were partially rusted in places, and that would have prevented them from forming a good connection with the wire. They were not connected securely as they were old and much used so that the clips could be easily moved to alter the length. Although there were many chances for an error to occur, there are none that obviously stand out. I do not feel, however, that the use of a thin wire in this experiment was a suitable choice, as the wire was never truly straight. It would be better to use a less malleable metal material, such as a bar, or in fact just to use the rheostat, as it is a long piece of coiled wire that can be connected at different lengths to change the resistance of the circuit. Experiment Two: Investigation into how varying the cross-sectional area of a wire will affect its resistance. Fair Test: In order to ensure that the experiment is as fair as possible, only one factor will be varied: the cross-sectional area of the wire. The other factors will be kept constant as shown below: The length of the wire will be kept constant at 40cm, as this factor has been explored in the experiment investigating length. I will be using Constantan wire throughout, as there were a larger variety of thicknesses available to me with this material. The temperature of the wires at the start must be the same so as to guarantee that a fair test is carried out. The temperature must be kept at room temperature, so that the electrons in the wire are not given differing amount of energy. Method: Safety: Precautions must be taken so that no water gets near any of the electrical appliances. It is imperative that you do not touch or place loose wires onto the wire that is being tested as it becomes hot during the experiment. Leave the wire after the experiment for a brief period in order to let the wire cool before touching. Apparatus:   Varying cross-sectional areas of Constantan wire (as designated in plan) to be tested, all 40cm in length Rheostat   Power supply   Voltmeter Ammeter 2 connecting wires with crocodile clips 4 connecting wires   A 1 metre ruler   Scissors The following circuit was used in the experiment investigating the cross-sectional area: Plan: 1. Connect circuit as shown in diagram above 2. Insert first cross-sectional area of wire to be tested into the circuit, in this case: 22 SWG. 3. Turn on the power supply and quickly take readings from both the ammeter and the voltmeter. 4. Repeat until all the following thickness have been tested and have had readings taken: a. 22 SWG b. 26 SWG c. 28 SWG d. 32 SWG e. 34 SWG As already mentioned in the experiment investigating length, the power supply used was built so that 6 amps was the maximum current allowed to pass through the circuit, and again I chose to set the power pack on 4 volts. The whole experiment must be repeated 3 times for accuracy, and then an average of these will be taken and used in the results table and graph. To make sure that the experiment is as accurate as possible, the wire being tested must be held straight, so that it does not come into contact with anything but the crocodile clips, and so that there are no bends in the wire. This is to ensure that it does not short circuit or affect the resistance, so as to make certain that the readings are not jeopardized. The readings must also be taken quickly after completion of the circuit, so that the current passing through the wire does not affect the temperature, and possibly resulting in an increase in the resistance that will provide confusing results. Upon testing the experiment I have come to the conclusion that the plan will produce accurate readings and very few errors. With it, I was able to obtain these results: Results: Thickness of wire (SWG) Average Voltage (V) (Volts) Average Current (I) (Amps) Resistance (R) (to 2d. p) The standard wire gauge (SWG) can be used to find out the radius. From this we can use the formula below to work out the cross-sectional area in mmi : ?ri Thickness of wire (SWG) Radius of wire (to 2d. p) (mm) Cross-sectional area (to 2d. p) (mmi ) 1/cross-sectional area (reciprocal) (to 2. Observations: Again, as in the first experiment, I noticed that the readings on the voltmeter and ammeter flickered between numbers, and so I took the first number as the most accurate measurement due to the effects of temperature change. At the beginning of the experiment I was also going to test a Constantan wire of 30 SWG, but when testing this wire it provided me with the same results as that of 32 SWG. This probably meant one of the wires was marked incorrectly, so I only used one of them and marked it as 32 SWG as this followed the curve of my graph. Anomalies: The graph implies that my reading for the resistance of the 28 SWG wire was incorrect, as it differs about 0. 85 ? from my line of best fit. This is probably because the wires were mixed up (as this had already occurred), as the result for this wire fits in with my line of best fit for a thickness of about 31 SWG. Conclusions: In view of my results and the graph I was able to construct from them, I have made the following conclusions: a. As predicted, when the cross-sectional area of the wire increased, the resistance also increased. b. The graph shows a strong trend forming a curved line, showing that the cross-sectional area of a conductor is inversely proportional to the resistance (as shown in the graph recording the reciprocal of the cross-sectional area): as the cross-sectional area doubles, the resistance will halve. From my analysis, I can say that my prediction was correct. This can be proved by carefully studying both electricity and electrical conductors. Electricity is the flow of energy from one place to another. Metal electrical conductors enable energy to be passed through them by containing a sea of freely mobile electrons, which carry the energy. When the electrons in the conductor are given enough energy, they are able to move from one end of the conductor to another, and therefore create a current. There is only a certain amount of space for the electrons to move in the conductor, and so collisions may occur between the electrons and any other immobile particles contained in the conductor. If the width (cross-sectional area) of the conductor, in this case a wire, is doubled, the electrons have double the amount of space, and so the probability of a collision between the electrons and any immobile or impurities in the wire is halved. This means that half the amount of electrical energy is being converted into heat energy by collisions, and so the resistance is also halved. Evaluation: There were a few mistakes in my experiment, mainly caused by carelessness in the storage of the materials used: 1. I included a rheostat in my circuit, but I did not adjust it for each reading (to control the current) as I believed that leaving the circuit connected for a long period of time would considerably alter the temperature of the wire, as collisions occurred and electrical energy was converted into heat, so the current readings vary slightly, which I believe will produce varying temperatures, but none so dramatically as to render my results totally inaccurate. 2. However, I attempted to take the readings for the ammeter and voltmeter quickly so that any temperature change would be very slight and would not affect the results. 3. There were some problems with the equipment I used throughout this experiment. The apparatus was not totally accurate as it was built and maintained to a poor standard due to lack of funds, for example the crocodile clips were coated in rust, and so the contact between it and the wire was not perfect. The wires were labelled incorrectly so the results were confusing. 4. Some of the anomalies will have been caused by human error in the measuring of the wire. This is because it is not very practical to hold a piece of wire straight and cut it perfectly at the designated length. The crocodile clips will also have not been placed exactly at the specific length, and so the actual length of the wire in the circuits will vary from the length recorded. Although there were a few mistakes in this experiment, on the whole I do believe that they provided me with a good basis for my conclusions.

puddn head wilson Essay -- essays research papers

Pudd’nhead Wilson   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Tragedy of Pudd’nhead Wilson juggles three plot lines, which all come together in a murder trial at the novel’s end. Pudd’nhead Wilson is a Northerner who comes to the small Missouri town of Dawson’s Landing to build a career as a lawyer. Immediately upon his arrival he alienates the townspeople, who don’t understand his wit. They give him the nickname â€Å"Pudd’nhead† and refuse to give him their legal work. He scrapes by on odd work and spends most of his time dabbling in scientific hobbies, most notably, fingerprinting.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Roxana, or Roxy, is a beautiful slave who can pass for white, though she is one- sixteenth black. To save her infant son from ever being sold away from her, she switches him with the child of her white master, who looks just like her son and was born on the same day. Her son Chambers, now called â€Å"Tom† grows up as a white man and heir to an estate. Her master’s child Tom, now called â€Å" Chambers†, grows up a slave. â€Å"Tom† grows into a cruel, cowardly man. His gambling debts lead him, under Roxy’s guidance, to rob houses, sell the now-freed Roxy as a slave, and finally to murder his uncle, Judge Driscoll, in a botched robbery attempt.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Luigi and Angelo are former sideshow performers. Good-looking and charming, they claim to be Italian twins, heirs of a deposed nobleman. They arrive in Dawson’s Landing to rent a room in Widow Cooper’s house, claiming the...

Sms Banking

Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 SMS BASED SECURE MOBILE BANKING Manoj V, Bramhe Department of Information Technology, RTM Nagpur university St. Vincent Pallotti College of Engg. And Technology, Nagpur, India [email  protected] com Abstract— M-banking has emerged as one of the main division of m-commerce. Mobile banking services consists of information inquiry, notifications and alerts, applications and payment transfer. Mobile based application is used for connecting customer handset with bank server for all such services.Current M-banking applications used by banks are facing security challenges for payment transfer banks are using secure payment gateway and other security measures which increases cost and infrastructure for bank but major day-to-day banking applications are inquiries, notifications and alerts. The problem with current banking applications is that they send data directly to customer in plain te xt form compromising with security. We present SMS based secure mobile banking which enhances security with minimum cost.In this approach bank hides customer transaction data is secure SMS using AES symmetric cryptographic algorithm and send it customer application supported handset. Customer application decrypts data in secure manner. Keywords: M-banking, MD5, AES, MPIN I. INTRODUCTION M-banking system is one which provides all daily banking operations to customer with one click of his mobile handset with supported application. M-banking system has potential to provide access or delivery of very specific and highly necessary information to customer as given in [2].Growth in the M-Banking is driven by various facilities like convenience of banking operations, greater reach to consumers and Integration of other m-commerce services with mobile banking. In M-banking there is no place restriction, it is highly penetration coefficient as growth of mobile phones are more than computers, i t is fully personalized and private increasing transaction authenticity and is 100% available all the time with users. However, there are several challenges that need to be addressed to completely utilize the benefits of the M-Banking like handset compatibility, security, scalability, reliability.Due to increase in use of mobile handsets for many m-commerce applications, Chances of mobile hacking for financial benefits are heavily increased. Currently mostly all banks in India and outside are sending text SMS directly to the customer handset for basic bank services without any security which can be accessed by any malicious person and can use this information for getting access to customer account. OTA (Over-the-air) mobile data can be hacked in network path from bank to customer mobile handset including MPIN, a password use for user identification in M-banking.Thus there is a need of secure and cost effective solution which can be easily provided on all types of handsets. Our objec tive is to provide cost effective, secure, fast M-banking solution combining features of cryptography. In this paper we have presented SMS based secure mobile banking with minimum cost using cryptography. II. M-BANKING CHANNELS M-banking can be executed using various channels like SMS, USSD, GPRS, WAP; Phone based Application, SIM Application. All of these channels are used separately or combined for various banking operations ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 472Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 A. Short Message Service (SMS) SMS is the simplest form of mobile banking. It is largely used for information-based services. SMS has the maximum reach amongst consumers since all the mobile phones support SMS. Short messages are stored and forwarded by SMS centres. These messages have some security issues. B. Unstructured Supplementary Services Delivery (USSD) USSD is a technology unique to GSM. It is a capability built into t he GSM standard for support of transmitting information over the signalling channels of the GSM network.USSD provides session-based communication. Turnaround response times for interactive applications are shorter for USSD than SMS. In USSD, the interaction is in the form of a continuous session as opposed to SMS. USSD is available on all handsets. C. Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) / General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) GPRS is a packet-switched data service available to GSM users. GPRS enables services such as WAP access, Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS), and Internet communication services such as email and World Wide Web access in mobile phones. . WAP is wireless application protocol used over GPRS. It is similar to Internet banking.The consumer’s handset needs to be WAP enabled. WAP banking is open to similar threats as Internet banking. D. Phone-based Application Phone based applications are developed in various languages like J2ME, . NET having advantages that it can use GPRS, USSD or SMS, MMS to carry the consumer data/instruction in an encrypted format and it is operator independent. These are secure application which resides on supported handset. E. SIM Application Tool Kit The SIM Application Toolkit allows for the service provider or bank to house the consumer’s mobile banking menu within the SIM card. STK is the most secure method of mobile banking.It allows the bank to load its own encryption keys onto the SIM card with the bank’s own developed application. III. CURRENT M-BANKING Even though various channels are available for M-banking most of the banks uses SMS as basic and cheap channel for basic banking operations. Currently all banks in India like ICICI, HSBC, SBI etc are not using any encryption techniques in SMS based M-banking system. They are using simple text based SMS for customer queries in which they directly send account information to customer only hiding some digits of account number which can be easily ha cked by any hacker or seen by anyone from message inbox.Even though some banks do provide some other channel like GPRS and WAP but cost of implementation is more and these facilities are not available on all types of mobile handset thus there is a need of secure and cost effective solution which can be easily provided on all types of handsets. A. Issues in M-banking 1) Lack of Standards: The lack of standards gives rise to lot of local and fragmented versions of m-payments offered by different stakeholders. Standards need to address security and privacy concerns of customers as well as interoperability between various implementations. ) Device constraints: There are technical issues related to the mobile devices . The mobile phones suffers from various constrains like less processing power and memory, bandwidth, short battery life , frequent disconnections, tiny screens, poor resolution and privacy issues. 3) Security Issues: Securing m-Commerce is even more difficult than wired tra nsaction. Device constraints raise the questions as to whether there will be adequate security for users without compromising the ease of use and speed.Current real time M-banking application of various banks uses plain text messages without any security algorithm for sending data hence any malicious user can access customer important data on mobile and used it for malicious purpose thus direct sending of data is not suggestible for M-banking. SMS are prone to spoofing and there are issues related to SMS encryption. However technology manufacturers are developing improved security for applications with authentication and encryption technologies and many claims that the ISSN : 0975-4024Dec 2011- Jan 2012 473 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 transaction using mobile device is fully secure. There are many techniques for secure M-banking operations but major research work has been done on Cryptography and steganography techn iques. Cryptography is a process of converting plaintext data into cipher text using cryptographic algorithms. They insure basic security requirements like authentication, confidentiality, integrity and non-repudiation. B. Basics of Short Message ServiceShort Message Service (SMS) is the ability to send and receive text messages to and from mobile telephones. SMS was launched as a part of GSM1 standard. Each short message is up to 160 characters in length. The 160 characters can comprise of words, numbers, or punctuation symbols. Short Message Service is a store and forward service; this means that messages are not sent directly to the recipient but via a network SMS Centre. SMS comprises two basic point-to-point services as Mobile-originated short message (MO-SM) and Mobile-terminated short message (MT-SM).Mobile-originated short messages are transported from MOcapable handset to SMSC whereas Mobile-terminated short messages are transported from SMSC to the handsets. The figure no. 1 shows a typical organization of network elements in a GSM network supporting SMS. Fig. 1. Basic model of SMS based M-banking The benefits of SMS to subscribers are convenience, flexibility, and seamless integration of messaging services and data access, delivery of notifications and alerts, guaranteed message deliver, reliable, low-cost communication mechanism, increased subscriber productivity, delivery of messages to ultiple subscribers at a time. The SMSC (Short Message Service Centre) is the entity which does the job of store and forward of messages to and from the mobile station. The SME (Short Message Entity), which is typically a mobile phone or a GSM modem, can be located in the fixed network or a mobile station, receives or sends SMS. The SMSC usually has a configurable time limit for how long it will store the message. SMS Gateway SMS Gateway is an interface between software applications mobile networks.An SMS Gateway allows interfacing software applications to send and /or receive SMS messages over mobile network. A GSM Modem modulates outgoing digital signals from a computer or other digital device to signals for a GSM network and demodulates the incoming GSM signal and converts it to a digital signal for the computer or other digital device. IV. PROPOSED SOLUTION Current real time M-banking application of various banks uses plain text messages without any security algorithm for sending data in SMS banking hence any malicious user can access customer important data on mobile.Proposed secure M-banking is based on symmetric cryptographic techniques where common secret key is shared among bank customer and bank server. Proposed Architecture consists of 4 components as Customer Mobile application, Bank Server application, Bank side mobile / GSM Modem, Bank database and wireless OTA [1]. Our solution uses windows mobile as client application platform and . NET framework as server side software. Customer interested in using M-Banking facilities has to make registration only once with corresponding bank. Bank has all necessary details of customer in database.Bank sends Customer–side mobile application developed for windows mobile to user. Application will be installed once on windows mobile supported handset. This application consists of Login screen along with get session key option, menu screen for bank services options, and encryption and decryption screens for outgoing and incoming secure SMS and send message screen to send SMS to server GSM handset /Modem. Application will be updated as and when bank updates it. ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 474 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479Bank will have GSM mobile Handset / GSM modem connected to bank application server. GSM handset will be connected to application server using either Bluetooth or USB cable having SIM card installed in it which has task of receiving, processing and replying customer SMS continuou sly. GSM handset/ modem are cheaper and can be easily installed but have slow speed for message handling which can be increased by connecting modem with SMSC centre over internet. Secure M-Banking server side application is developed in windows compatible environment like VB. NET which can be installed on bank application server.Application is consisting of SMS Service, Information Manage, Account Details Manage, User Request modules to receive and process secure encrypted message from customer mobile. SMS Service module is responsible for retrieving and replying secure SMS automatically whenever they reaches server GSM handset / Modem. Bank database consists of various tables storing customer details pertaining to his personal information, Account information and transaction information. Bank database stores customer confidential information like his MPIN, Mobile identification pin and encryption keys in encrypted and secure manner.We have discussed various major types of M-Banking channels as SMS, GPRS, WAP and USSD out of which every channel has own advantages and disadvantages. WAP and GPRS are good and provide session based security but they are handset dependent and also in rural part of India all mobile operators are not providing respective services. USSD is used along with SMS and requires separate infrastructure. Thus SMS channel is simple, easy to implement, cheaper and widely used channel which is device independent. Current SMS based M-banking service has many drawbacks s SMS is inherently developed in GSM for non-sensitive message transfer among users. Mutual authentication, text encryption, end-to-end security and non-repudiation is not present in design of GSM architecture [16]. Major issues with SMS based banking are SMS Spoofing which is an attack where malicious user sends out SMS message which appears to be sent by original sender. Current SMS architecture allows hiding original sender’s address by altering respective field in origin al SMS header. Also SMS has encryption only during path from base transreceiver station and mobile station. End-to-end encryption is not available.V. IMPLEMENTATION We have implemented proposed solution in . NET platform for windows mobile in windows environment. Customer mobile application in . NET framework runs on supported windows mobile handset for which we have used HTC mobile and bank server application is running in . NET along with any GSM handset connected in Bluetooth / USB mode to it. We have added secure SMS structure which provides extra security along with satisfying security parameters. This secure SMS will add extra security features like cryptographic and hashing algorithm to satisfy confidentiality, integrity, authentication and non-repudiation.Our system is based on secure SMS protocol and it uses SMS as media to send and receive encrypted information. . A. Secure SMS Message Structure The secured SMS message is divided into multiple fields’s to accommodat e for the various security checks required for the protocol. Figure no. 2 shows the structure overview for a secure SMS message. The use of each labelled structure is explained below. Account No. Session Key Cipher Text (6 digit) (Generated From MPIN) (Plain Text + MPIN) Message Digest Fig. 2. Secure SMS message Structure Secure SMS message structure proposed by us consists of 4 fields’s as shown in above figure.Account Number: – It is customer account number in bank which is first field used for authentication purpose. This information is stored in plain test format so that at the server end, information can be retrieved to get required keys from database. Session key: – It is onetime key randomly generated from customer MPIN inputted in bank server database during M-Banking registration process. This key is stored in 2nd field of message. Customer makes a request to get session key from his handset to bank server. Bank server will reply this with encrypted ses sion keys stored in file, which will be stored on customer handset. ISSN : 0975-4024Dec 2011- Jan 2012 475 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 Cipher Text: – This text is created from combination of plain text and MPIN and stored in 3rd filed of message structure. Main idea behind this is to protect data from malicious attacker. As MPIN is most important data and from which session keys are created to be used for encryption and decryption purpose, hence it s send in encrypted manner. Message Digest: – Message digest is used for checking integrity. Customer message digest is calculated from combination of plain text and MPIN and stored in 4th field of secure SMS.MD5 algorithm is used to calculate message digest on both ends. This received digest will be compared with calculated digest at bank server end , if not found of same size then message will be discarded as fake transaction and no message will be send to mobile handset from which request is sent. B. Sending Secure SMS from Client Mobile Whenever customer wish to make any transaction using M-banking, he will run application installed on handset and provide all necessary details. We have used 6 transactions for testing purpose and information collected from user on his handset is used to generate secure SMS.After registration customer will get mobile application installed once on his windows mobile. Customer will enter 4-digit MPIN which will be stored in server database in encrypted format using his password. For non-repudiation purpose we have added concept of one time session key. Server uses customer MPIN to generate session key randomly and again stored them in encrypted format. Customer runs the banking application and feed details of 6-digit account number, 4-digit MPIN and 4digit password and click button to get session key. Server sends generated session key to customer handset which will be stored in encrypted format on his handset.Customer goes to menu screen, chooses requires account type and type of transaction he wish to perform and goes to next screen. Mobile client application shows 4 entries on next screen consisting of session key received, generated fixed plain text message depending upon transaction chosen, cipher text created from combination of plain text and MPIN and 4-part secure message. Secure SMS contains account number in plain text, session key in encrypted format, cipher text created from plain text and MPIN and message digest calculated from message.Customer will send message to sever using as normal message. C. Receiving and Replying Secure SMS from Server Module Proposed Server is running on computer installed with required software like VB. NET, Windows mobile device centre and SDK, . NET compact framework, MS-access and Server side application. Server side application has four modules as SMS Service, Information Manage, Transaction Manage and User Requests. SMS service module retrieves SMS received at Server side handset and decode it to get original query send by customer.Server application process query, get required data from bank database and then sends it in encrypted format to customer mobile through bank side modem. Whenever Customer sends any secure SMS containing his transaction query to server side GSM Modem, Server application automatically retrieves secure SMS and deletes it from server attached handset to avoid flooding of message inbox. We have used ActiveX control for this purpose. Bank Server application splits received secure SMS in same 4-parts. Server reads first part, a plain text 6-digit account number and compares it with database stored account number.If match is not found, it will send message â€Å"Wrong Account Number† to customer handset. If account match is found then server uses 2nd part of secure SMS, which is session key send by user to decrypt 3rd part of received secure SMS. After decrypting 3rd part of SMS, server application gets combination of plaintext as customer original transaction query followed by 4-digit MPIN. Server application compares received MPIN with stored MPIN from server table if a match is not found, will send message â€Å"Wrong Pin Number† to customer handset.Server calculates message digest of 3rd part received using MD5 algorithm and compare it with received massage digest, 4th part of secure SMS to check for message integrity. If match is not found, server generates message on server side â€Å"Fake Transaction† and sends nothing to customer side handset as it may be off any malicious user. If all security checks are proper, Server application process query of customer and get required data from database encrypts data using session key received from customer and sends automatically to customer handset.VI. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS We have developed two applications for client and server side. Mobile client application is developed using . NET compact framewor k and VB. NET, installed on windows mobile supported HTC mobile device. This application is used by customer for various M-banking transactions to send encrypted secure SMS to bank ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 476 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 Server and gets back encrypted reply from bank Server.Client and Server side application performs symmetric encryption and decryption using 256-bit AES symmetric encryption algorithm. MD5 algorithm is used for hashing purpose. Server side bank application is developed using VB. NET it uses SMS toolkit, an ActiveX control to retrieve and process secure SMS automatically. Server side application also contains certain modules for database management of customer account and transactions Normally symmetric cryptographic algorithm don’t have non-repudiation as both party shares common secret key but we have used session key concept for maintaining non-repudiation propert y of encryption.Since Session key is used only once and created randomly, no two users can have common session key and it is created from MPIN, a master key which customer only knows so he cannot deny that he has done transaction. We have carried out 6 types of transaction including Account Balance, Mini transactions, Cheque Book Request, Cheque Stop request, Pay Bill and Fund Transfer. Following are some sample client application module. The figure no. 3 shows session key, user query in fixed plain text format, cipher text generated from combination of plain text and his MPIN and 4-part secure SMS message generated as per format discussed.This last message is sent to server. Fig. 3. Generating 4-Part Secure Message This secure SMS is retrieved by server side SMS service module. Server application split message and decrypt it to get original transaction query of customer. This query is processed to get response data from database which is firstly encrypted and then send to customer handset. Customer handset get auto reply from server side in cipher text, which is decrypted on mobile by client side application to get server response in plain text. The Figure no. 4 shows response obtained automatically from server for account balance.This reply consists of 3 parts. First part is common session key used by server and client. Second part is cipher text received from server application in secure manner. Third part is plain text message obtained after decrypting secure message received from server. Client mobile application uses 256-bit AES algorithm to decrypt message using common session key. This message will be hidden from customer and he will only get final query results in plain text format but for result purpose we have shown this screen. ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 477Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 Fig. 4. Secure Reply from Server To be a secure system, it must satisfy Confidentiality, Authentication, Integrity and Non-Repudiation Secure SMS system maintains confidentiality using AES cryptography and Non-Repudiation using session key. Here 3-factor authentication is used for authentication and security purpose whereas Message integrity is carried out using MD5 algorithm. VII. CONCLUSION AND FUTURE WORK We have implemented a secure SMS based Mobile Banking system.The system allows user to carry out all banking transaction securely from anywhere, anytime. All messages from user windows mobile are sent in encrypted format to bank server. Bank server decrypt message, process query and encrypt result in SMS. Server sends message to customer which will be decrypted on his handset. The evaluation of the system was studied for varying banking transaction and under various security threatening malicious activities were recorded. Performance of the transaction is studied. We have executed few banking transaction from HTC windows mobile and using VB.Net server side applicati on. We have used LG GSM mobile as server attached mobile device. Experiments shows that secure SMS Mobile banking provides cost effective and secure system with satisfying Confidentiality, Authentication, Integrity and Non-Repudiation using symmetric cryptography. Application can be used on any windows mobile supported handset from anywhere as no GPRS and WAP are required. We have implemented system using symmetric key AES algorithm. In future better power consumption algorithm like blowfish can be tried out.Steganogrpahy can also be applied for secure M-banking transactions. We can use concept of STK, SIM application toolkit where bank can stored the application and encryption keys on SIM. REFERENCES [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Mohammad Shirali-Shahreza and M. Hassan Shirali-Shahreza, â€Å"Mobile banking Services in bank area†, SICE Annual Conference 2007, Japan Martinez Borreguero, F. Javier and Chaparro Pelaez, Julian,†Spanish Mobile Banking Services: An Adoption Study†, Proceedings of the International Conference on Mobile Business 2005.Mohammad Shirali-Shahreza,†Improving Mobile Banking Security Using Steganography â€Å", International Conference On Information Technology. Przemyslaw Krol, Przemyslaw Nowak, Bartosz Sakowicz,†Mobile Banking Services Based On J2ME/J2EE†, CADSM’2007. Yousuf S. AlHinai, Sherah Kurnia and Robert B. Johnston,†Adoption of Mobile, Commerce Services by Individuals: A Meta-Analysis of the Literature†, Sixth International Conference on the Management of Mobile Business . ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 478 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. (6), 2011, 472-479 [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] T N T Nguyen, P Shum and E H Chua,†Secure end-to-end mobile payment System†. Ashutosh Saxena, Manik Lal Das and Anurag Gupta,†MMPS: A Versatile Mobile-to-Mobile Payment System†, Proceedings of the International Conference On Mobile Business 2005. Iuon-Chang Lin and Yang-Bin Lin,†An Efficient Steganography Scheme for M- Commerce†. Mohammad Shirali-Shahreza and M. Hassan Shirali-Shahreza, †Text Steganography in SMS†, 2007 International Conference on Convergence Information Technology.Sandeep Singh Ghotra, Baldev Kumar Mandhan, Sam Shang Chun Wei, Yi Song, Chris Steketee, †Secure Display and Secure Transactions Using a Handset†, Sixth International Conference on the Management of Mobile Business. Jiehua Wang, Song Yuan, â€Å"A Novel Security Mobile Payment System Based On Watermarked Voice Cheque†. M. Shirali-Shahreza, â€Å"Stealth Steganography in SMS†, Proceedings of the third IEEE and IFIP International Conference on Wireless and Optical Communications Networks 2006.Kewin Chikomo, Ming Ki Chong, Alpan Arnab, Andrew Hutchison, â€Å"Security of Mobile Banking†. Dilla Salama Abdul Minaam. Hatem M. Abdul Kadir, Mohily Mohamed Hadhoud ,† Evaluating the effects of Symmetric Cryptographic algorithms on Power Consumption for different data types†, International Journal of Network Security, Volume 11, September 2010. Managing the Risk of Mobile Banking Technologies, Bankable Frontier Associates. Deshpande Neeta, kamalapur Snehal,† Implementation of LSB Steganography and its Evaluation for various bits†. ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 479 Sms Banking Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 SMS BASED SECURE MOBILE BANKING Manoj V, Bramhe Department of Information Technology, RTM Nagpur university St. Vincent Pallotti College of Engg. And Technology, Nagpur, India [email  protected] com Abstract— M-banking has emerged as one of the main division of m-commerce. Mobile banking services consists of information inquiry, notifications and alerts, applications and payment transfer. Mobile based application is used for connecting customer handset with bank server for all such services.Current M-banking applications used by banks are facing security challenges for payment transfer banks are using secure payment gateway and other security measures which increases cost and infrastructure for bank but major day-to-day banking applications are inquiries, notifications and alerts. The problem with current banking applications is that they send data directly to customer in plain te xt form compromising with security. We present SMS based secure mobile banking which enhances security with minimum cost.In this approach bank hides customer transaction data is secure SMS using AES symmetric cryptographic algorithm and send it customer application supported handset. Customer application decrypts data in secure manner. Keywords: M-banking, MD5, AES, MPIN I. INTRODUCTION M-banking system is one which provides all daily banking operations to customer with one click of his mobile handset with supported application. M-banking system has potential to provide access or delivery of very specific and highly necessary information to customer as given in [2].Growth in the M-Banking is driven by various facilities like convenience of banking operations, greater reach to consumers and Integration of other m-commerce services with mobile banking. In M-banking there is no place restriction, it is highly penetration coefficient as growth of mobile phones are more than computers, i t is fully personalized and private increasing transaction authenticity and is 100% available all the time with users. However, there are several challenges that need to be addressed to completely utilize the benefits of the M-Banking like handset compatibility, security, scalability, reliability.Due to increase in use of mobile handsets for many m-commerce applications, Chances of mobile hacking for financial benefits are heavily increased. Currently mostly all banks in India and outside are sending text SMS directly to the customer handset for basic bank services without any security which can be accessed by any malicious person and can use this information for getting access to customer account. OTA (Over-the-air) mobile data can be hacked in network path from bank to customer mobile handset including MPIN, a password use for user identification in M-banking.Thus there is a need of secure and cost effective solution which can be easily provided on all types of handsets. Our objec tive is to provide cost effective, secure, fast M-banking solution combining features of cryptography. In this paper we have presented SMS based secure mobile banking with minimum cost using cryptography. II. M-BANKING CHANNELS M-banking can be executed using various channels like SMS, USSD, GPRS, WAP; Phone based Application, SIM Application. All of these channels are used separately or combined for various banking operations ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 472Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 A. Short Message Service (SMS) SMS is the simplest form of mobile banking. It is largely used for information-based services. SMS has the maximum reach amongst consumers since all the mobile phones support SMS. Short messages are stored and forwarded by SMS centres. These messages have some security issues. B. Unstructured Supplementary Services Delivery (USSD) USSD is a technology unique to GSM. It is a capability built into t he GSM standard for support of transmitting information over the signalling channels of the GSM network.USSD provides session-based communication. Turnaround response times for interactive applications are shorter for USSD than SMS. In USSD, the interaction is in the form of a continuous session as opposed to SMS. USSD is available on all handsets. C. Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) / General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) GPRS is a packet-switched data service available to GSM users. GPRS enables services such as WAP access, Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS), and Internet communication services such as email and World Wide Web access in mobile phones. . WAP is wireless application protocol used over GPRS. It is similar to Internet banking.The consumer’s handset needs to be WAP enabled. WAP banking is open to similar threats as Internet banking. D. Phone-based Application Phone based applications are developed in various languages like J2ME, . NET having advantages that it can use GPRS, USSD or SMS, MMS to carry the consumer data/instruction in an encrypted format and it is operator independent. These are secure application which resides on supported handset. E. SIM Application Tool Kit The SIM Application Toolkit allows for the service provider or bank to house the consumer’s mobile banking menu within the SIM card. STK is the most secure method of mobile banking.It allows the bank to load its own encryption keys onto the SIM card with the bank’s own developed application. III. CURRENT M-BANKING Even though various channels are available for M-banking most of the banks uses SMS as basic and cheap channel for basic banking operations. Currently all banks in India like ICICI, HSBC, SBI etc are not using any encryption techniques in SMS based M-banking system. They are using simple text based SMS for customer queries in which they directly send account information to customer only hiding some digits of account number which can be easily ha cked by any hacker or seen by anyone from message inbox.Even though some banks do provide some other channel like GPRS and WAP but cost of implementation is more and these facilities are not available on all types of mobile handset thus there is a need of secure and cost effective solution which can be easily provided on all types of handsets. A. Issues in M-banking 1) Lack of Standards: The lack of standards gives rise to lot of local and fragmented versions of m-payments offered by different stakeholders. Standards need to address security and privacy concerns of customers as well as interoperability between various implementations. ) Device constraints: There are technical issues related to the mobile devices . The mobile phones suffers from various constrains like less processing power and memory, bandwidth, short battery life , frequent disconnections, tiny screens, poor resolution and privacy issues. 3) Security Issues: Securing m-Commerce is even more difficult than wired tra nsaction. Device constraints raise the questions as to whether there will be adequate security for users without compromising the ease of use and speed.Current real time M-banking application of various banks uses plain text messages without any security algorithm for sending data hence any malicious user can access customer important data on mobile and used it for malicious purpose thus direct sending of data is not suggestible for M-banking. SMS are prone to spoofing and there are issues related to SMS encryption. However technology manufacturers are developing improved security for applications with authentication and encryption technologies and many claims that the ISSN : 0975-4024Dec 2011- Jan 2012 473 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 transaction using mobile device is fully secure. There are many techniques for secure M-banking operations but major research work has been done on Cryptography and steganography techn iques. Cryptography is a process of converting plaintext data into cipher text using cryptographic algorithms. They insure basic security requirements like authentication, confidentiality, integrity and non-repudiation. B. Basics of Short Message ServiceShort Message Service (SMS) is the ability to send and receive text messages to and from mobile telephones. SMS was launched as a part of GSM1 standard. Each short message is up to 160 characters in length. The 160 characters can comprise of words, numbers, or punctuation symbols. Short Message Service is a store and forward service; this means that messages are not sent directly to the recipient but via a network SMS Centre. SMS comprises two basic point-to-point services as Mobile-originated short message (MO-SM) and Mobile-terminated short message (MT-SM).Mobile-originated short messages are transported from MOcapable handset to SMSC whereas Mobile-terminated short messages are transported from SMSC to the handsets. The figure no. 1 shows a typical organization of network elements in a GSM network supporting SMS. Fig. 1. Basic model of SMS based M-banking The benefits of SMS to subscribers are convenience, flexibility, and seamless integration of messaging services and data access, delivery of notifications and alerts, guaranteed message deliver, reliable, low-cost communication mechanism, increased subscriber productivity, delivery of messages to ultiple subscribers at a time. The SMSC (Short Message Service Centre) is the entity which does the job of store and forward of messages to and from the mobile station. The SME (Short Message Entity), which is typically a mobile phone or a GSM modem, can be located in the fixed network or a mobile station, receives or sends SMS. The SMSC usually has a configurable time limit for how long it will store the message. SMS Gateway SMS Gateway is an interface between software applications mobile networks.An SMS Gateway allows interfacing software applications to send and /or receive SMS messages over mobile network. A GSM Modem modulates outgoing digital signals from a computer or other digital device to signals for a GSM network and demodulates the incoming GSM signal and converts it to a digital signal for the computer or other digital device. IV. PROPOSED SOLUTION Current real time M-banking application of various banks uses plain text messages without any security algorithm for sending data in SMS banking hence any malicious user can access customer important data on mobile.Proposed secure M-banking is based on symmetric cryptographic techniques where common secret key is shared among bank customer and bank server. Proposed Architecture consists of 4 components as Customer Mobile application, Bank Server application, Bank side mobile / GSM Modem, Bank database and wireless OTA [1]. Our solution uses windows mobile as client application platform and . NET framework as server side software. Customer interested in using M-Banking facilities has to make registration only once with corresponding bank. Bank has all necessary details of customer in database.Bank sends Customer–side mobile application developed for windows mobile to user. Application will be installed once on windows mobile supported handset. This application consists of Login screen along with get session key option, menu screen for bank services options, and encryption and decryption screens for outgoing and incoming secure SMS and send message screen to send SMS to server GSM handset /Modem. Application will be updated as and when bank updates it. ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 474 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479Bank will have GSM mobile Handset / GSM modem connected to bank application server. GSM handset will be connected to application server using either Bluetooth or USB cable having SIM card installed in it which has task of receiving, processing and replying customer SMS continuou sly. GSM handset/ modem are cheaper and can be easily installed but have slow speed for message handling which can be increased by connecting modem with SMSC centre over internet. Secure M-Banking server side application is developed in windows compatible environment like VB. NET which can be installed on bank application server.Application is consisting of SMS Service, Information Manage, Account Details Manage, User Request modules to receive and process secure encrypted message from customer mobile. SMS Service module is responsible for retrieving and replying secure SMS automatically whenever they reaches server GSM handset / Modem. Bank database consists of various tables storing customer details pertaining to his personal information, Account information and transaction information. Bank database stores customer confidential information like his MPIN, Mobile identification pin and encryption keys in encrypted and secure manner.We have discussed various major types of M-Banking channels as SMS, GPRS, WAP and USSD out of which every channel has own advantages and disadvantages. WAP and GPRS are good and provide session based security but they are handset dependent and also in rural part of India all mobile operators are not providing respective services. USSD is used along with SMS and requires separate infrastructure. Thus SMS channel is simple, easy to implement, cheaper and widely used channel which is device independent. Current SMS based M-banking service has many drawbacks s SMS is inherently developed in GSM for non-sensitive message transfer among users. Mutual authentication, text encryption, end-to-end security and non-repudiation is not present in design of GSM architecture [16]. Major issues with SMS based banking are SMS Spoofing which is an attack where malicious user sends out SMS message which appears to be sent by original sender. Current SMS architecture allows hiding original sender’s address by altering respective field in origin al SMS header. Also SMS has encryption only during path from base transreceiver station and mobile station. End-to-end encryption is not available.V. IMPLEMENTATION We have implemented proposed solution in . NET platform for windows mobile in windows environment. Customer mobile application in . NET framework runs on supported windows mobile handset for which we have used HTC mobile and bank server application is running in . NET along with any GSM handset connected in Bluetooth / USB mode to it. We have added secure SMS structure which provides extra security along with satisfying security parameters. This secure SMS will add extra security features like cryptographic and hashing algorithm to satisfy confidentiality, integrity, authentication and non-repudiation.Our system is based on secure SMS protocol and it uses SMS as media to send and receive encrypted information. . A. Secure SMS Message Structure The secured SMS message is divided into multiple fields’s to accommodat e for the various security checks required for the protocol. Figure no. 2 shows the structure overview for a secure SMS message. The use of each labelled structure is explained below. Account No. Session Key Cipher Text (6 digit) (Generated From MPIN) (Plain Text + MPIN) Message Digest Fig. 2. Secure SMS message Structure Secure SMS message structure proposed by us consists of 4 fields’s as shown in above figure.Account Number: – It is customer account number in bank which is first field used for authentication purpose. This information is stored in plain test format so that at the server end, information can be retrieved to get required keys from database. Session key: – It is onetime key randomly generated from customer MPIN inputted in bank server database during M-Banking registration process. This key is stored in 2nd field of message. Customer makes a request to get session key from his handset to bank server. Bank server will reply this with encrypted ses sion keys stored in file, which will be stored on customer handset. ISSN : 0975-4024Dec 2011- Jan 2012 475 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 Cipher Text: – This text is created from combination of plain text and MPIN and stored in 3rd filed of message structure. Main idea behind this is to protect data from malicious attacker. As MPIN is most important data and from which session keys are created to be used for encryption and decryption purpose, hence it s send in encrypted manner. Message Digest: – Message digest is used for checking integrity. Customer message digest is calculated from combination of plain text and MPIN and stored in 4th field of secure SMS.MD5 algorithm is used to calculate message digest on both ends. This received digest will be compared with calculated digest at bank server end , if not found of same size then message will be discarded as fake transaction and no message will be send to mobile handset from which request is sent. B. Sending Secure SMS from Client Mobile Whenever customer wish to make any transaction using M-banking, he will run application installed on handset and provide all necessary details. We have used 6 transactions for testing purpose and information collected from user on his handset is used to generate secure SMS.After registration customer will get mobile application installed once on his windows mobile. Customer will enter 4-digit MPIN which will be stored in server database in encrypted format using his password. For non-repudiation purpose we have added concept of one time session key. Server uses customer MPIN to generate session key randomly and again stored them in encrypted format. Customer runs the banking application and feed details of 6-digit account number, 4-digit MPIN and 4digit password and click button to get session key. Server sends generated session key to customer handset which will be stored in encrypted format on his handset.Customer goes to menu screen, chooses requires account type and type of transaction he wish to perform and goes to next screen. Mobile client application shows 4 entries on next screen consisting of session key received, generated fixed plain text message depending upon transaction chosen, cipher text created from combination of plain text and MPIN and 4-part secure message. Secure SMS contains account number in plain text, session key in encrypted format, cipher text created from plain text and MPIN and message digest calculated from message.Customer will send message to sever using as normal message. C. Receiving and Replying Secure SMS from Server Module Proposed Server is running on computer installed with required software like VB. NET, Windows mobile device centre and SDK, . NET compact framework, MS-access and Server side application. Server side application has four modules as SMS Service, Information Manage, Transaction Manage and User Requests. SMS service module retrieves SMS received at Server side handset and decode it to get original query send by customer.Server application process query, get required data from bank database and then sends it in encrypted format to customer mobile through bank side modem. Whenever Customer sends any secure SMS containing his transaction query to server side GSM Modem, Server application automatically retrieves secure SMS and deletes it from server attached handset to avoid flooding of message inbox. We have used ActiveX control for this purpose. Bank Server application splits received secure SMS in same 4-parts. Server reads first part, a plain text 6-digit account number and compares it with database stored account number.If match is not found, it will send message â€Å"Wrong Account Number† to customer handset. If account match is found then server uses 2nd part of secure SMS, which is session key send by user to decrypt 3rd part of received secure SMS. After decrypting 3rd part of SMS, server application gets combination of plaintext as customer original transaction query followed by 4-digit MPIN. Server application compares received MPIN with stored MPIN from server table if a match is not found, will send message â€Å"Wrong Pin Number† to customer handset.Server calculates message digest of 3rd part received using MD5 algorithm and compare it with received massage digest, 4th part of secure SMS to check for message integrity. If match is not found, server generates message on server side â€Å"Fake Transaction† and sends nothing to customer side handset as it may be off any malicious user. If all security checks are proper, Server application process query of customer and get required data from database encrypts data using session key received from customer and sends automatically to customer handset.VI. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS We have developed two applications for client and server side. Mobile client application is developed using . NET compact framewor k and VB. NET, installed on windows mobile supported HTC mobile device. This application is used by customer for various M-banking transactions to send encrypted secure SMS to bank ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 476 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 Server and gets back encrypted reply from bank Server.Client and Server side application performs symmetric encryption and decryption using 256-bit AES symmetric encryption algorithm. MD5 algorithm is used for hashing purpose. Server side bank application is developed using VB. NET it uses SMS toolkit, an ActiveX control to retrieve and process secure SMS automatically. Server side application also contains certain modules for database management of customer account and transactions Normally symmetric cryptographic algorithm don’t have non-repudiation as both party shares common secret key but we have used session key concept for maintaining non-repudiation propert y of encryption.Since Session key is used only once and created randomly, no two users can have common session key and it is created from MPIN, a master key which customer only knows so he cannot deny that he has done transaction. We have carried out 6 types of transaction including Account Balance, Mini transactions, Cheque Book Request, Cheque Stop request, Pay Bill and Fund Transfer. Following are some sample client application module. The figure no. 3 shows session key, user query in fixed plain text format, cipher text generated from combination of plain text and his MPIN and 4-part secure SMS message generated as per format discussed.This last message is sent to server. Fig. 3. Generating 4-Part Secure Message This secure SMS is retrieved by server side SMS service module. Server application split message and decrypt it to get original transaction query of customer. This query is processed to get response data from database which is firstly encrypted and then send to customer handset. Customer handset get auto reply from server side in cipher text, which is decrypted on mobile by client side application to get server response in plain text. The Figure no. 4 shows response obtained automatically from server for account balance.This reply consists of 3 parts. First part is common session key used by server and client. Second part is cipher text received from server application in secure manner. Third part is plain text message obtained after decrypting secure message received from server. Client mobile application uses 256-bit AES algorithm to decrypt message using common session key. This message will be hidden from customer and he will only get final query results in plain text format but for result purpose we have shown this screen. ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 477Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. 3 (6), 2011, 472-479 Fig. 4. Secure Reply from Server To be a secure system, it must satisfy Confidentiality, Authentication, Integrity and Non-Repudiation Secure SMS system maintains confidentiality using AES cryptography and Non-Repudiation using session key. Here 3-factor authentication is used for authentication and security purpose whereas Message integrity is carried out using MD5 algorithm. VII. CONCLUSION AND FUTURE WORK We have implemented a secure SMS based Mobile Banking system.The system allows user to carry out all banking transaction securely from anywhere, anytime. All messages from user windows mobile are sent in encrypted format to bank server. Bank server decrypt message, process query and encrypt result in SMS. Server sends message to customer which will be decrypted on his handset. The evaluation of the system was studied for varying banking transaction and under various security threatening malicious activities were recorded. Performance of the transaction is studied. We have executed few banking transaction from HTC windows mobile and using VB.Net server side applicati on. We have used LG GSM mobile as server attached mobile device. Experiments shows that secure SMS Mobile banking provides cost effective and secure system with satisfying Confidentiality, Authentication, Integrity and Non-Repudiation using symmetric cryptography. Application can be used on any windows mobile supported handset from anywhere as no GPRS and WAP are required. We have implemented system using symmetric key AES algorithm. In future better power consumption algorithm like blowfish can be tried out.Steganogrpahy can also be applied for secure M-banking transactions. We can use concept of STK, SIM application toolkit where bank can stored the application and encryption keys on SIM. REFERENCES [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Mohammad Shirali-Shahreza and M. Hassan Shirali-Shahreza, â€Å"Mobile banking Services in bank area†, SICE Annual Conference 2007, Japan Martinez Borreguero, F. Javier and Chaparro Pelaez, Julian,†Spanish Mobile Banking Services: An Adoption Study†, Proceedings of the International Conference on Mobile Business 2005.Mohammad Shirali-Shahreza,†Improving Mobile Banking Security Using Steganography â€Å", International Conference On Information Technology. Przemyslaw Krol, Przemyslaw Nowak, Bartosz Sakowicz,†Mobile Banking Services Based On J2ME/J2EE†, CADSM’2007. Yousuf S. AlHinai, Sherah Kurnia and Robert B. Johnston,†Adoption of Mobile, Commerce Services by Individuals: A Meta-Analysis of the Literature†, Sixth International Conference on the Management of Mobile Business . ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 478 Manoj V, Bramhe / International Journal of Engineering and Technology Vol. (6), 2011, 472-479 [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] T N T Nguyen, P Shum and E H Chua,†Secure end-to-end mobile payment System†. Ashutosh Saxena, Manik Lal Das and Anurag Gupta,†MMPS: A Versatile Mobile-to-Mobile Payment System†, Proceedings of the International Conference On Mobile Business 2005. Iuon-Chang Lin and Yang-Bin Lin,†An Efficient Steganography Scheme for M- Commerce†. Mohammad Shirali-Shahreza and M. Hassan Shirali-Shahreza, †Text Steganography in SMS†, 2007 International Conference on Convergence Information Technology.Sandeep Singh Ghotra, Baldev Kumar Mandhan, Sam Shang Chun Wei, Yi Song, Chris Steketee, †Secure Display and Secure Transactions Using a Handset†, Sixth International Conference on the Management of Mobile Business. Jiehua Wang, Song Yuan, â€Å"A Novel Security Mobile Payment System Based On Watermarked Voice Cheque†. M. Shirali-Shahreza, â€Å"Stealth Steganography in SMS†, Proceedings of the third IEEE and IFIP International Conference on Wireless and Optical Communications Networks 2006.Kewin Chikomo, Ming Ki Chong, Alpan Arnab, Andrew Hutchison, â€Å"Security of Mobile Banking†. Dilla Salama Abdul Minaam. Hatem M. Abdul Kadir, Mohily Mohamed Hadhoud ,† Evaluating the effects of Symmetric Cryptographic algorithms on Power Consumption for different data types†, International Journal of Network Security, Volume 11, September 2010. Managing the Risk of Mobile Banking Technologies, Bankable Frontier Associates. Deshpande Neeta, kamalapur Snehal,† Implementation of LSB Steganography and its Evaluation for various bits†. ISSN : 0975-4024 Dec 2011- Jan 2012 479

Pancreatitis Medical Report Essay

Mr. Tabouya was diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis and Pancreas Divisum at birth. These diseases have caused the patient to have Gallstones which were found and removed by ERCP 2 years ago. During the administering of the procedure the physician discovered the patient to have a pancreatic pseudocyst. The treatment for this condition was drainage with an endoscope. The onset of Hypertension (high blood pressure) was detected in the patient 5 years ago and he has been taking Furosemide (lasix) since the detection. He has also been taking Azathioprine for help with his weak immune system and to aid his rheumatoid arthritis. The patient’s history also shows low levels of triglyceride and was diagnosed with Hypertriglyceridemia, and has a severe case of pancreatitis. The patient may have a history of alcoholism. Due to the patient being obese, blood tests were ordered and the findings of elevated levels of lipids and too much calcium were noticed. Therefore the diagnosis of hyperlipidemia and a reasonable recognition of hypercalcemia were established. Because of the new and pre-existing conditions another blood test was ordered to check the insulin levels. We determined there was a decreased level of insulin, along with a small increased level of blood amylase which is parallel to the lipase prognosis. This led us to the conclusion that the patient is suffering from severe pancreatitis. While using a Stethoscope to listen to the abdomen, the physician noticed no bowel sounds. After an abdominal CT scan was performed the patient was diagnosed with critical pancreatitis. Feasible complications involve infection in the pancreas and the onset of type II diabetes. Physician recommended a low fat diet, and prescribed oral pancreatic enzymes to help with the digestion process as well as insulin to regulate his blood sugar along with abstinence of alcohol. Surgery was mentioned to return the drainage of the pancreatic discharges.

Introduction To Cross

Introduction To Cross Cultural psychology Cultural psychology is defined by involving culture as a significant factor in determining psychological and behavioral elements in an individual. From this perspective, individuals derive behaviors from close association with the immediate cultural environment. Alternatively, culture is also established from a set of commonly held behaviors among people living under the same environmental conditions.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Introduction To Cross-Cultural Psychology Paper specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Cultural psychology involves studying how cultural practices evolve and affect human behavior and vice versa. In this regard, understanding how cultural psychology regulates an individual’s psychology is necessary to psychologists. In addition, learning behavioral tendencies acknowledged by another individual from similar cultural background is critical in cultural psychology. Howev er, cultural psychology does not involve psychological processes as compared to cross-cultural psychology. Cross-cultural psychology Cross-cultural psychology involves learning how different elements of a culture influence an individual’s behavior. From this perspective, this branch of psychology acknowledges that a culture is made up of various elements such as customs, values, stereotypes and attitudes. Moreover, cross-cultural psychology unearths the similarities and differences among world cultures, and how they are expressed by different groups of people. This justifies the commonality of behaviors replicated among diverse cultures. In this regard, cross-cultural psychology tries to define universal behaviors and how they impact individual behaviors, as well as family life and social experiences. Unlike cultural psychology, cross-cultural psychology involves the study of emotions, child development personalities, social behaviors and language acquisition. In cross-cultur al psychology, individuals’ behaviors are best understood from an ideological perspective. Therefore, understanding indigenous ideologies shared among people of the same culture is vital in this branch of psychology. Cross-cultural psychology evaluates the applicability of cultural diversity under several environmental situations. For example, understanding cultural diversity is essential in solving life challenges by applying same cultural behaviors among diverse groups of people. The relationship The relationship between cultural and cross-cultural psychology is from a definition point of view. In this regard, both definitions suggest that the relationship between cultures has an impact on human behavior and vice versa. However, cultural psychology examines cultural influences on individuals living within a predetermined region. On the other hand, cross-cultural psychology compares similarities and differences across diverse cultures from different regions. An in-depth anal ysis on cultural psychology reveals that cross-cultural psychology studies are based on data collected from cultural psychology.Advertising Looking for essay on psychology? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More This means that data collected from cultural psychology provides a framework and a background to conduct a cross-cultural psychology study. Another relationship between cultural and cross-cultural psychology is evidenced by psychological processes. For example, cultural psychology depends on processes such as individual goals and cognitive ability at the individual level. Cross-cultural psychology is influenced by processes experienced at individual and interpersonal levels. Some of the processes evidenced at the interpersonal level include interpersonal communication skills, family and social influence. Cultural psychology focuses its study on the systematic link between a predetermined culture and a set of psychol ogical variables. On the other hand, a cross-cultural psychology study is only meaningful when a comparison of at least two cultures from different socio-cultural contexts is conducted. Critical thinking Critical thinking is crucial in providing the right approach and perspective towards problem solving. Cross-cultural psychology studies involve problem-solving procedures that are systematic and scientific in nature. In this regard, critical thinking is important in analyzing statistics and presenting findings as facts. In addition, critical thinking is used to assess formulated hypotheses as a matter of differentiating speculations from facts. Cross-cultural psychology involves using individual intellect when observing opinions and analyzing data. Consequently, this requires an intellectual perspective that understands the uniqueness of the underlying social phenomenon. Critical thinking is considered to be a meta-thought necessary in reducing biases evidenced in scientific studies . Critical thinking has the capacity of achieving accurate information and preventing general assumptions from affecting the research process. Methodology Research in a cross-cultural psychology study must achieve the predetermined objectives. In most cases, the objectives include description, interpretation, prediction and management. Quantitative and qualitative research methodologies are the most effective in cross-cultural psychology studies. Quantitative research methodology must constitute a measure of central tendency to establish variations and statistic relationships among variables. From this perspective, quantitative methodology provides the cross-cultural psychology study with a comparative perspective. However, qualitative methodologies are immeasurable and are effective when dealing with psychological phenomenon such as dreams. Quantitative research methodologies are effective when used to achieve a relationship or correlation between variables associated with human ac tivity. This is in consistency with the fact that cross-cultural psychology studies are based on correlation approaches. Other research methodologies suitable for cross-cultural psychology research include surveys, focus groups, interviews, questionnaires and experiments. However, each methodology is effective when used under the right conditions.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Introduction To Cross-Cultural Psychology Paper specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More As indicated earlier, valuable data is critical in achieving the main research goals. From this perspective, statistical measurement of collected data must be conducted from a comparative approach using a quantitative methodology. Finally, qualitative research methodologies are most effective for experiments and when subjected to natural settings.