Hong Kong

A study by The Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK) suggests that learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) are more likely to initiate communicating, if they are frequently engaged in Informal Digital Learning of English (IDLE).

Lingnan University (LU) hosted an International Symposium on Social Policy and Social Services Challenges in the Greater Bay Area on 23 June to discuss the latest research and practices concerning social policy and social services challenges in Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area (GBA). The Symposium was jointly organised by the Asia Pacific Institute of Ageing Studies and Lingnan University-South China University of Technology Joint Research Centre for Greater Bay Area Social Policy and Governance, and was also funded by University Grants Committee. Over 60 scholars and participants joined from mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore and other regions.

Hosted by Lingnan University (LU) in Hong Kong, the Times Higher Education Liberal Arts Forum was held on 23 and 24 June, the first day of the conference attracted an audience of over 800 from all around the world.

Lingnan University (LU) and National Chung Cheng University (CCU) in Taiwan signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to promote cooperation in education and academic research between the two institutions. At the signing ceremony held virtually on 22 June 2022, Prof Joshua Mok Ka-ho, LU Acting President, and Prof Hao Feng-ming, Vice-President of CCU, signed the MOU on behalf of the two parties.

Lingnan University (LU) in Hong Kong held a kick-off ceremony for its “LU Jockey Club Health and Financial Education Programme for Elderly” today (21 June), attracting more than 300 programme participants, representatives of partner institutions and friends of LU to join. Funded by The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust, the three-year programme aims to strengthen and promote older adults’ knowledge of consumer behaviour, financial management skills, and healthcare management by offering them a series of training and inter-generational communication activities.

Many applications of big data in language education are associated with multimedia learning, and a considerable proportion of the practices of integrating multimedia into language learning resources is associated with annotations for vocabulary learning. The literature indicates that multimedia annotations are very effective in promoting vocabulary learning and that pictorial annotations lead to effective vocabulary learning, but their creation is challenging and time-consuming.

Lingnan University (LU) comes first in Hong Kong and second in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan universities in the Chinese University Translation Ability Index 2021 recently released by the National Translation Competence Research Center of Beijing Foreign Studies University.

A large body of research supports the critical role of handwriting in reading, both in alphabetic languages and Chinese. Studies of alphabetic languages found that handwriting practice facilitates early letter categorisation ability.

A research team led by Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) has found that a proteolytic enzyme called membrane-type 1 matrix metalloproteinase (MT1-MMP) plays an important role in the regulatory mechanism of fullness, or satiety, and it could serve as a promising potential drug target for the management of obesity.

As physical activity (PA) has significant benefits for health and fitness, the WHO recommends that children and adults engage at least 60 minutes and 150 minutes of moderate-intensity PA per week, respectively. However, owing to global urbanisation, technological advances, and increasing convenience in daily activities, inadequate PA in all aspects of life has become a major public health concern. In Hong Kong, 71% of adults do not meet the WHO PA recommendations. This persistent and growing health-related problem indicates an urgent need to develop an intervention programme that can effectively promote PA at the individual, family, community, and city-wide levels. Therefore, a set of community-based family ‘holistic health’ intervention programmes were developed, implemented, and evaluated in the previous Happy Family Kitchen Movement (HFKM) project to promote well-being and health in Hong Kong.

Lingnan University (LU) has achieved remarkable results in the 2022 Top Universities and Top Scientists Rankings conducted by Research.com based on h-index performance and bibliometric indicators.

Lingnan University (LU) announced today (12 May) its Strategic Plan for 2022-28 which is encapsulated by the tagline “Stronger, Soaring” to move the University forward in seven strategic areas: Optimising Liberal Arts Education in the Digital Era; Augmenting Postgraduate Studies; Inspiring Research with Impact; Interfacing Responsible Leadership with Glocal Entrepreneurship; Bolstering Institutional Advancement, Alumni Development and Branding; Enhancing Campus Infrastructure and Planning Campus Expansion; and Deepening the Connection to the Greater Bay Area and the Rest of Mainland.

The Education University of Hong Kong has received four silver medals and two bronze at the 48th International Exhibition of Inventions of Geneva in March 2022. The exhibition is a renowned event to showcase innovations and inventions from all over the world. The award-winning inventions cover a variety of areas: behavioural and cognitive therapy, music education, environmental detection, image captioning and product search engines.

Recent studies have demonstrated that character strengths, including a group of individual characteristics that have moral value and lead to ‘good virtues,’ play a crucial role in students’ participation in society and achievement of success. Kindness, which is a significant aspect of character strength, has been considered essential for school programmes to improve students’ mental health and foster positive well-being. As a key social context, schools influence students’ academic, psychological, and social well-being, providing mastery of knowledge and shaping their whole-person development. Numerous studies have highlighted the social aspects of school functions and recognised the effects of schooling on students’ academic and psychological outcomes.

Hong Kong is a multilingual society, but nearly 90% of the population speak Cantonese as a first language. Cantonese is used in both formal and informal settings. Many non-local people living and working in Hong Kong therefore need to learn Cantonese in order to integrate themselves into the local community. Despite its dominant status, however, Cantonese has never been formalised and implemented into the school curriculum. Consequently, learning and teaching materials and teaching methods vary considerably. Dr Andy Chin Chi-on, Head and Associate Professor at the Department of Linguistics and Modern Language Studies, The Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK), proposed a research programme adopting a more scientific and objective approach to promote the learning and teaching Cantonese.

A Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) collaborative research study has revealed that certain gut microbial enzymes mediate the reactivation of triclosan (TCS) from its inactive glucuronide metabolite. TCS is an antimicrobial agent commonly used in a wide range of consumer products, and it is associated with the development of colitis.

As COVID-19 continues to spread across the world, there is mandatory 7 to 21-day quarantine for travellers who arrive in Hong Kong and Mainland China from overseas. Since self-isolation may affect people’s emotional health adversely, Lingnan University (LU)’s Wofoo Joseph Lee Consulting and Counselling Psychology Research Centre (WJLCCPRC) has designed a self-assessment questionnaire and intervention exercise to help people in quarantine cope better psychologically.

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are toxic organic pollutants, which are usually deposited in soil and marine sediments through petroleum contamination, fossil fuel burning, fallout from air pollution, and terrestrial runoff. The dietary intake of contaminated food is considered to be one of the major sources of total human exposure to PAHs. Previous studies revealed that concentrations of PAHs in human blood plasma collected from Hong Kong residents were positively correlated with consumption of seafood, including fish, which is a major source of protein in Hong Kong. The contamination of PAHs in farmed fish depends partly on the quality of feed. Fish meal and fish oil are commonly used in fish feed, but they are also a source of organic pollutants, including PAHs. Formulated feeds have become the major diet of many important farmed species.

Lingnan University (LU) is delighted to announce the admission of Hong Kong’s top boccia athlete Ng Chi-hang through Lingnan’s new Direct Entry Stream for Top Athletes (DESTA) under the University Grants Committee’s Student-Athlete Learning Support and Admission Scheme (SALSA). Ng represented Hong Kong in boccia at China’s 10th National Games for Persons with Disabilities and 7th National Special Olympic Games in 2019 and The Asian Para Games at Incheon in 2014. He will be joining LU’s Bachelor of Business Administration (Honours) programme in the coming academic year.

A population health survey in Hong Kong revealed that 50% of people aged 15 to 84 were either overweight or obese because of insufficient intake of wholegrains, fruits, and vegetables, and the increasing consumption of sugar-sweetened and alcoholic beverages, convenience foods, take-out food, and other high-density, low-nutrient foods.

The urgent need for sustainable development, combined with reaction to climate change from industry and society, has urged many governments in the Asia-Pacific region to develop policies that will lead to a low-carbon economy. The resulting structural changes in labour markets require that new skills be incorporated into technical vocational education and training (TVET). But a research of Dr Margarita Pavlova, Associate Professor at the Department of International Education, The Education University of Hong Kong, revealed that countries in the Asia-Pacific region lack the green skills to implement and sustain low-carbon economies.

Dr Leung Chi-hin, Assistant Professor at the Department of Cultural and Creative Arts, The Education University of Hong Kong, was invited by Contemporary Musiking Hong Kong (CMHK) to be a performing artist in the Out Of Out Heads (OOOH!) mini-festival to explore a new way for intensely intimate exchanges at close proximity in May 2020. The theme of the mini-festival was social distancing in response to the current pandemic situation.

Dr Jesus Alfonso D. Datu, Assistant Professor at the Department of Special Education and Counselling (SEC), The Education University of Hong Kong, was named a Rising Star from the Association for Psychological Science (APS) in February 2022. The designation is presented to outstanding psychology researchers in the earliest stages of their careers.

Computer game uses a camera and AI-based movement recognition to teach sign language to a broader public.

Hong Kong has an aging population. The number of people 65 or older is forecast to increase to 2.16 million by 2031 and 2.56 million by 2041. As a result, Hong Kong’s recurrent social welfare and health expenditure as a percentage of nominal GDP is forecast to increase from $52.4 billion in 2014 to $563.6 billion in 2042. Hong Kong may experience a structural financial deficit within a decade because of higher social and health spending for older adults and a smaller working-age population.

A surprising tree-inspired discovery is helping scientists design surfaces that encourage different liquids to move in varying directions.

Whale and dolphin post-mortem imaging could breathe new life into marine conservation.

Dr Hou Wai-kai, Associate Professor at the Department of Psychology (PS), The Education University of Hong Kong, has been elected a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science (APS) for his outstanding contribution to the discipline. 

Endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs), pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) are extensively used in industrial and consumer applications. They are widely recognised as typical contaminants of emerging concern because of their environmentally persistent and bio-accumulative properties. Even in very low concentrations, they can disturb our hormonal balance, leading to reproductive impairment, abnormal development and growth retardation. Water and wastewater treatment systems worldwide face the challenge of effectively removing these contaminants.

The coronavirus pandemic has accelerated the use of robots and an urgent need for an advanced human-machine interface (HMI) system that can seamlessly connect users and robots. A research team co-led by City University of Hong Kong (CityU) and collaborating institution recently developed an innovative HMI system, which consists of flexible, multi-layered electronic skin and provides both visual and haptic feedback to users. The system can teleoperate the robot to imitate the user's actions to perform complicated tasks. It demonstrates the potential for conducting Covid-19 swab tests and nursing patients with infectious diseases.