The elderly (senior) is a unique generation with specific housing preferences. This study aims to provide an overview on the elderly housing preferences of the Malaysian generations. The objectives of this study are: (i) To define elderly; (ii) To identify the elderly housing preferences features; and (iii) To determine the elderly housing preferences by different age group (generations). The study adopts mixed-method strategy and revealed; (i) Health; (ii) Safety; (iii) Convenience; (iv) Amenity; and (v) Community as the preferred elderly housing features. This study provides guidance to the main actors of property development on the preferred elderly housing features.Keywords: Elderly (Senior) Housing; Aging-in-Place; The Residential Environment Preferences; GenerationseISSN: 2398-4287 © 2020. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BYNC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians) and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia.DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/e-bpj.v5i13.2102

Background: The Movement Control Order (MCO) due to COVID-19 has brought people’s life to almost a standstill. How people across different ages and income groups are mentally and physically adjusting to the unprecedented situation in Malaysia is yet to be documented. Hence, an empirical study was conducted to capture this real-time situation during COVID-19 MCO. Objective: To describe the mental and emotional wellbeing of Malaysians and how they care for themselves and and their family during the COVID-19 pandemic and during MCO. Methods: A survey on 3,288 respondents was conducted towards the end of the first phase of MCO. The questionnaire was administered through various online social media platforms using snowball and convenience sampling. Results: About 90% of the respondents gave their priority to health needs and in providing food, shelter and clothings for their family while education is at the bottom of their priority list. Overall index of mental wellbeing and emotional stability went beyond 57% up to 95% indicating that people are mentally and emotionally disturbed with COVID-19. The index ranges between 49% up until 90% in the ability to care for themselves and family. Conclusion: Health needs was at the top of the priority list of the high income group and least in low income group. While for the low income group, the top most priority concerns their financial stability. Education was given the least priority by all income groups. Their greatest fear is the infection of COVID-19 that would harm their family’s health. They were also stressed with the COVID-19 pandemic that could affect the Malaysian economy and thus worried about losing their sources of income if this pandemic prolongs over an indefinite period.

The continual increase of the elderly population will render Malaysia with an ageing nation status by 2030. However, less emphasise was taken to accommodate the needs and preferences. This study aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the Elderly-Friendly Housing Design Features Preferences among Malaysians by using the mixed-method research strategy. Six (6) identified elderly-friendly housing design features preferences were; (1) Bathroom; (2) Bedroom; (3) Kitchen; (4) Floor; (5) Living Room; and (6) Staircase. The revealed findings will assist the industry in understanding the elderly housing needs and preferences better to enhance the quality of life of the Malaysian generations. Keyword: Elderly (Senior) Generation, Elderly-friendly housing, Elderly-Friendly Housing Design Features eISSN: 2398-4287© 2020. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BYNC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians) and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/ebpj.v5i15.2510.

Perceived self-efficacy refers to the people’s beliefs in their capabilities to exert control over their own functioning and over events that affect their live. Accessing student self-efficacy can provide educator with additional insight of students’ subsequent performance. Hence, this study examined the relationship between self-efficacy and mathematics performance among Applied Science university students. The sample consisted of first year Applied Science university students from two different backgrounds; matriculation and diploma. Students were given two sets of survey questionnaire which were developed by the authors to measure the students’ self-efficacy and their ability to solve the integral calculus questions. The questions were divided into four domains namely concept of calculus, translation from concept to formula, techniques of integration and recognition of functions. The findings from this study did not fully provide evidence to support the view that positive self-efficacy beliefs in mathematics increase mathematics performance since there was no significant impact on what the students perceived and what they actually scored. However, this study found out that if the aspects of self-efficacy were to be examined individually to see if there was any significant impact towards mathematics performance, it can be seen that Techniques of integration (r = 0.243, p < 0.05) and Recognition of function (r = 0.205, p < 0.05) were significant and positively related to mathematics performance to some extent. The study also showed that self–efficacy is correlated with all of the aspects of performance which the correlations values are as follows: Concept in Calculus (r = 0.730, p < 0.01), Translation from Concept to Formula (r = 0.705, p < 0.01), Techniques of integration (r = 0.852, p < 0.01) and Recognition of function (r = 0.773, p < 0.01). The results of this study can help the educators to evaluate and improve the effectiveness of the current mathematics teaching.

The PM10 concentration is subject to significant changes brought on by both gaseous and meteorological variables. The aim of this research was to explore the performance of a hybrid model combining the support vector machine (SVM) and the boosted regression trees (BRT) technique in predicting the PM10 concentration for 3 consecutive days. The BRT model was trained by utilizing maximum daily data in the cities of Alor Setar, Klang, and Kuching from the years 2002 to 2017. The SVM–BRT model can optimize the number of predictors and predict PM10 concentration; it was shown to be capable of predicting air pollution based on the models’ performance with NAE (0.15–0.33), RMSE (10.46–32.60), R2 (0.33–0.70), IA (0.59–0.91), and PA (0.50–0.84). This was accomplished while saving training time by reducing the feature size given in the data representation and preventing learning from noise (overfitting) to improve accuracy. This knowledge establishes the foundation for the development of efficient methods to prevent and/or minimize the health effects of PM10 exposure on one’s health.