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We are kicking off 2023 strong with January’s top reads! The new year’s resolutions that you have set are said to set the tone for the rest of your year. However, have you ever wondered where new year’s resolutions stem from?

The ancient Babylonians are the first recorded civilization to celebrate new year’s, although their new year fell mid-march after their crops were planted. It is said that they were the first people to make new year’s resolutions. This tradition was then modernized into the new years we know today. During the reign of Julius Caesar, Ancient Romans celebrated and recognized the New Year to be on January 1st. Ancient Romans selected this date in honor of the Greek God Janus, who they believed symbolically looked back into the previous year and ahead into the future. To celebrate the New Year, the Romans committed to good deeds for the coming year.

If reading often was one of your resolutions, this run-down of top reads may inspire your new discoveries. To give you an idea of all the topics you can dive into on Zendy, we’ll be exploring why healthcare professionals should be more involved in combatting false beliefs on the internet and how WhatsApp can be used as a learning tool to pick up a new language, we also peek at color associated emotional and behavioral responses. We also discuss severe depression in late life and how to tackle it, and finally, the impact that sustainable labeling has on consumer behavior.

The role healthcare professionals play outside of medical settings

This journal article explores the thin line between freedom of speech and the spread of misinformation on the internet. In this technological age, information is always a click away. We’ve all received threads on certain weight-loss tips and steps we should be taking to improve our health. We tend to forget that many of these tips, experiences, and personal views are not regulated or accurate information. This article argues that the threat of misinformation lies beyond clinical settings, and therefore so do the obligations of healthcare professionals. This piece also highlights the types of speech the government can regulate and how healthcare discourse can potentially be governed and monitored without dabbling in the First Amendment rights.

Read more: Why Healthcare Professionals Should Speak Out Against False Beliefs on the Internet

Exploring WhatsApp as a learning tool

This journal article discusses how WhatsApp can be used as an educational tool. This is interesting because WhatsApp’s features align well with the online tools one would need to grasp a new language. The study is aimed at English foreign language learners to significantly improve their conversational English using WhatsApp’s convenient features such as videos, voice notes, texting, and even the use of emojis. However, since this is a classroom setting, certain rules would need to be applied to using social media as a means of education.

Read more: WhatsApp and its Use to Improve Student’s Pronunciation

The psychology behind colors

We come across a plethora of colors every day. Colors hold much more biological and psychological significance than we might think. According to this journal article, colors can trigger psychological, physical, biological, and metabolic reactions within humans. It explores whether the way we react to colors is a learned response or an innate one. Honoring psychology’s well-known nature vs. nurture debate, this article highlights the significance of each color and how literature supports and proves the emotions and feelings each color can invoke in human beings. It also carefully studies the effect of culture and religion and how those factors affect how an individual perceives certain colors.

Read more: Color-associated emotional and behavioral responses: A study on the associations emerged via imagination

Severe depression in late life

This unique case study explores the severe depression that elderly people face. We follow Mrs. B’s journey into her medical and psychological treatments and dissect how clinicians should play a more active role in scanning depression in older adults. This study proved that signs of inactivity and feeling neglected should not be dismissed as the effects of aging but rather should be perceived as symptoms of depression. The depression that older adults face can be tackled through treatments such as psychotherapy, behavioral activation, and electroconvulsive therapy. While the elderly become more dependent, this study proves that therapy can, once again, have them thriving independently.

Read more: Older Adults with Severe, Treatment-Resistant Depression: “I got my mother back.”

How sustainable labeling affects consumer behavior

As consumers become more aware of the products and transparency becomes the best marketing tool, this journal article discusses the impact green labeling has on consumer behavior. The researchers discuss how sustainable labeling may work for some products as consumers assign different levels of importance to them. For example, green labeling on dairy products might not grab consumer attention as the environmental issue comes from the very consumption of dairy. The article explores the variables that drive a consumer to attempt to shift to sustainable buying habits and willingly pay more to support these practices. Conscious consumers want to see how brands adapt their products and re-position themselves to be environmental-friendly.

Read more: Hey, did you see that label? It’s Sustainable!: Understanding the role of sustainable labeling in shaping sustainable purchase behavior for sustainable development

Discover millions of journals, proceedings, e-books, and more on Zendy.

Before libraries and books had the opportunity of moving online, many philanthropists, politicians, and librarians started travel libraries to spread knowledge within their communities. Whether a bookmobile or a book wagon, these book collections became quite popular among readers in the 19th and 20th centuries, especially among the wealthy and educated. The many benefits of reading had made it worth going all these extra miles from town to town.

Reading can improve your language, expand your imagination, enhance your retention, make you more opinionated, increase your critical thinking abilities, teach you a new skill, promote subject-specific knowledge, or even simply provide an escape. We hope that by using Zendy, you’ll be able to harvest all these benefits and more. We promise that this month’s top reads will inspire, enrich, and entertain you.

1. Weight-loss Salvation: How Real People Lose Weight and Keep It off (e-Book)

Weight gain and weight loss have been the subject of numerous debates. Even professionals tend to disagree about the best practices regarding weight-loss plans. One thing is certain though, most of us want to prevent weight gain. This book follows the journey of one such person, who had struggled with weight gain and tried all sorts of different diet plans and pills until he finally found a sustainable way of losing weight. The book is co-authored by Stuart McRobert, who has previously written multiple books about exercise and health. Throughout the book, both authors detail the best way to approach and apply weight-loss plans for both men and women by addressing the psychological and physical aspects of weight gain, food addiction, conditioning, distractions, weight-loss scams, caloric expenditure, finding motivation, and plateauing. Access this rich resource to learn more healthy recipes, facts about walking, stretching, exercise, and other tips that can help you maintain your ideal weight.

2. Rethinking Sociocultural Notions of Learning in the Digital Era: Understanding the affordances of networked platforms (Journal Article)

It is no secret that the nature of networking and social connections has changed with the emergence of the digital world, especially with social media cementing its presence in our daily lives. In addition to keeping us updated and connected to the rest of the world, networking platforms also have the ability to facilitate our learning experiences. Plenty of these platforms’ features can be invaluable in developing a robust remote learning journey that can cater to different learners’ needs. Sociocultural learning theories can shed light on the importance of the various social, practical, cultural, historical, and other aspects that create more immersive and impactful learning. This article from the Journal of E-Learning and Digital Media dives into the affordances of digital platforms and how theories of learning could be revisited to match the changing world we live in. Learn more about how the visibility, scalability, flexibility, and persistence of the digital world could help improve learning outcomes.

3. C++ Fundamentals: Hit the Ground Running with C++, the Language That Supports Tech Giants Globally (e-Book)

C++ is one of the many programming languages that programmers use to communicate with computers. This type of code has been used for plenty of purposes, such as developing games, creating software, organising data structures, building browsers, operating systems, and applications. C++ is one of the fastest programming languages and one that is great for developing digital products that require high-quality processing of images and visuals. Anyone familiar with programming will be able to benefit from this book’s comprehensive content. Learn more about the recent features of C++, understand the best practices, and write bullet-proof code with the help of standard templates.

4. “You Win, or You Die”: The Royal Flush of Power in Game of Thrones (Journal Article)

College literature courses are increasingly diversifying content and including more contemporary works into their curricula. George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire is one of the novel series that has gained widespread popularity among the general public as well as made its way into the minds and hearts of university professors, literary critics, and literature students. This article explores some of the elements that have made this work a fertile ground for interpretation and analysis. The representation of different forms of governance in Martin’s work is examined and their diverging natures compared in this article. By adopting a Foucauldian approach, the author draws on the many complex realities and relationships of power that the world of Game of Thrones paints. Learn more about why this fantasy series can make for thought-provoking scholarly consideration.

5. Wanted: Heroic Leaders to Drive the Transition to “Business Beyond Usual” (Journal Article)

We cannot hope to change the world by doing the same thing we have been doing for ages. As the need for sustainability grows, changing the way we do business grows with it. In order to solve the environmental issues we are facing today, we need to move towards ‘business beyond usual’. This article addresses these needs from a practical perspective, highlighting the gap between theory and practice while reviewing research findings related to sustainability. By focusing on what business leaders need to take action for corporate sustainability, the article discusses the shortcomings of micro foundation research and questions whether motivation, emotions, and values could truly translate into sustainable action. Read more about how to empower and create the ‘heroic’ leaders of tomorrow.

Access articles, e-books, magazines, and more on Zendy – your gateway to knowledge and discovery! Zendy Plus is available in Algeria, Bahrain, Jordan, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, and the UAE. For everywhere else in the world, there’s always Zendy Open.

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Apoptosis is a bodily function that plays a role in preventing cancer. It is the natural process that rids your body of damaged or unwanted cells. If you’ve never come across the term before, you might want to read more about it on Zendy! You can learn more about various scientific, biochemical, and physiological processes like artificial gene amplification and extension, cell physiology, immunohistochemistry, immunoblotting, and more on Zendy. More importantly, you’ll be able to narrow down your search results for each keyword string you enter by subject, publication, language, or origin..

Once again, we’ve rolled out our top reads to give you a brief idea about all that you can find on Zendy. In this month’s top 5 Zendy reads, you will learn more about the advantages and significance of pharmacy automation, the cognitive and psychological benefits of music therapy, the linguistic and extra-linguistic elements of stylistic devices in English discourse, how business information managers and other professionals are dealing with the corporate repercussions of the pandemic, and potential teaching methodologies that can help overcome the challenges of teaching history courses.

Here are Zendy’s top 5 reads for December:

1. Five Trends in Pharmacy Automation. (Magazine Article)

Without pharmacy automation, pharmacy staff might be tied down to carrying out mechanical tasks like counting pills. Instead, these professionals’ expertise and time can be repurposed. Pharmacy automation has the ability to reduce expenses, save space, and increase security. This article from the Hospitals & Health Networks magazine lists all the benefits and the recent trends of implementing smart, automated cabinets in hospital pharmacies. By eliminating the need to report on drug inventories, nurses will have more time to consecrate to patient care and other life-saving or administrative tasks.

To learn more about how automated cabinets can improve efficiency and help reduce the risk of narcotic abuse among hospital staff, click here.

2. “Don’t Let Me Go” – A Case Study on Music Therapy in Early-stage Dementia (Case Study)

Science is just beginning to uncover the ways in which music can be therapeutic. In this detailed case study, we come to meet Ana, a lovely lady in her 70s, who suffers from early dementia. Throughout the music therapy sessions conducted, Ana gradually opens up to her therapist, who learns of her emotionally traumatic experience of losing her daughter. Becoming familiar with the session structure and not being confronted about her confusion or disorientation, Ana became less resistant to therapy and grew more relaxed throughout her sessions. Singing seemed to be Ana’s preferred musical engagement, so her therapist guided her in writing a song following the parody technique. Since Ana was already familiar with the melody, this ensured that she wouldn’t be overwhelmed with too much new information. After some weeks of engaging with her new therapist, Ana was reading poetry, reciting hymns, and had already written a song about her family.

Step into Ana’s music therapy sessions and learn more about how to comfort and connect with people with dementia. Read the full case study here.

3. Cognitive and pragmatic approach to using stylistic devices in English literary discourse (Research Paper)

Discourse theory has evolved a lot since the great philosopher and sociologist Michel Foucault first coined the term. Similarly, different theories and advances in literary and linguistic studies have affected how we view, interpret, and analyse language. This paper examines language and literature through the lens of cognitive, discourse, and pragmatic theories. The author applies these theoretical considerations to 20^th-century works of literature to demonstrate how semantic, syntactic, and extra-linguistic factors influence the production and perception of meaning. To exemplify these principles, the author refers to antithesis, a stylistic device. Contemporary scholars have moved away from absolution when it comes to interpreting meaning. Increasingly, weight has been attributed to the text’s contextual factors, the readers’ cultural backgrounds, immediate surroundings, personal experiences, and what the author refers to as the “cognitive structures and processes that underlie the production and reception of language”.

To continue reading about how linguistic factors and pragmatic constituents play a role in making stylistic devices more appealing to audiences, click here.

4. ‘Never let a good crisis go to waste’ – The 2020 Business Information Review Survey: Part I. (Journal Article)

The Business Information Review Survey is a reputable, peer-reviewed publication that has been running for 30+ years. This article from the journal combines insights from leading information managers that work in different sectors, such as financial services, law, professional services, manufacturing, mining, and technology. The conversations among these professionals centre around changes in corporate structure, staffing, the impact of technology, content delivery, working arrangements, and client engagement. Several participants shared their strategic priorities for the coming year, and perhaps not surprisingly, most of these priorities were consistent across different organisations. It seems clear that continuous efforts towards organisational alignment and readiness to respond to changing demands and needs make for unmistakable pillars of success among today’s information managers.

Continue reading the first part of this article and learn more about recent experiences with organisational models and staffing trends here.

5. Teaching the History of Psychology (Journal Article)

History courses tend to be less engaging than other courses simply because of the static quality of the course content itself. Prof. Christopher D. Green’s experience with teaching History of Psychology courses is not different. In this article from the Canadian Psychology journal, Prof. Green analyses students’ attitudes towards the course material and proposes different approaches to render it more entertaining and relevant to psychology students. For one whole semester, Prof. Green collected public tweets from students about the course only to find out that most of them displayed a sense of boredom and resentment. To bring the course material closer to undergraduates, Prof. Green suggests offering a deeper and often broader context to events which led to the birth of different theories and schools of thought, connecting events and intellectual developments through causal relationships whenever possible.

Wondering why students struggle to relate to dry subject matter in history courses or how to motivate and further engage them? Read the full article to learn more.

Access articles, e-books, magazines, and more on Zendy – your gateway to knowledge and discovery! Zendy Plus is available in Algeria, Bahrain, Jordan, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, and the UAE. For everywhere else in the world, there’s always Zendy Open.

Sign up here!