bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Introduction à « Pratiques de consciences »
Authors: Midol Nancy , Chenault Marceau
Published: January 2018

Les activités en STAPS sont en première ligne pour des expériences sensibles et cognitives sur les études des pratiques de consciences. Dans le domaine des apprentissages, nous n’avons pas assez pris en compte l’intelligence du corps inconscient, celui qui réagit à l’environnement sans qu’on ait pu en prendre conscience et qui anticipe l’action consciente. La conscience est un rapport au monde et questionne l’interface entre l’intériorité et l’extériorité de l’être. Ce dossier basé sur l’analyse de situations et d’expériences en contexte d’apnée, de danse, de rituel chamanique, d’arts martiaux, de taiji quan, de qigong et de méditation, de course à pied…, offre un matériel riche de données. Le domaine des STAPS pourrait habiter une vraie science interdisciplinaire en prenant en compte les études sur la cognition incarnée et concevoir l’apprentissage à l’interface des sciences (éthologie, anthropologie, écologie, physiologie, enaction…) et de la philosophie. Les scientifiques nous proposent de changer d’échelle pour interpréter le monde et soi-même dans l’univers auquel nous appartenons. Les sciences sont en train de déplacer le curseur de l’individu vers les intrications du multiple et des transformations selon une approche holistique nouvelle. « Pratiques de consciences » est une entrée pertinente pour ce grand chambardement.
Hybridations ontologiques de pratiques de conscience sous l’effet de la mondialisation
Authors: McEwen Laurel , Midol Nancy
Published: January 2018

Quels sont les effets de la mondialisation sur des pratiques qui touchent à l’intimité, que ce soient des pratiques de santé, de loisir, de spiritualité… comme les néo-chamanismes qui se déploient en Europe et ailleurs depuis le XX e  siècle et massivement depuis les années 2000 ? Comment des pratiques issues de sociétés aux ontologies différentes et même divergentes (il y a discontinuité entre les humains et les non-humains versus il y a continuité…) peuvent-elles être délocalisées, déracinées et s’acclimater dans d’autres cultures pour s’y implanter ? Quels processus de prise de conscience cela implique-t-il chez les pratiquants et sur leur connaissance du monde qui les environne ? C’est à quoi l’article répond dans sa première partie. Dans la seconde, il est répondu au phénomène symétrique mais inverse, à savoir qu’est-ce qui est issu de notre culture occidentale, de France même, comme la plongée en apnée, et qui traverse les frontières ontologiques du « naturalisme » pour produire des formes « aesthétiques » nouvelles qui récupèrent des éléments d’ontologies animistes, totémistes et analogistes pour prendre finalement une dimension cosmique ?
« Quand l’esprit ne peut sentir le corps » : dépasser le dualisme cartésien du corps-esprit avec la pratique du qigong
Authors: Winiger Fabian , Chenault Marceau , Midol Nancy
Published: January 2018

La discussion suivante met en évidence des parallèles entre les « circuits d’information » décrits dans le travail de Yuasa Yasuo (1925-2005) et les expériences rapportées lors d’un travail de terrain ethnographique effectué avec des praticiens de qigong du style «  Zhineng qigong  ». Nous observons leur progression dans quatre étapes successives d’unité corps-esprit qui aboutissent au dépassement de la séparation cartésienne entre le corps et l’esprit et finalement une guérison de leur maladie. J’illustre cette progression avec le cas clinique de Luca, un homme de 32 ans né en Italie, qui explique son rétablissement d’une blessure invalidante au bas du dos en termes de « réunification » de son corps, qi et esprit grâce au zhineng qigong . J’argumente que le qigong et les pratiques comparables de la conscience du corps impliquent des techniques de mouvement, de respiration, de visualisation et, plus encore, façonnent une nouvelle relation entre le corps et l’esprit, soi et les autres, qui peut être vécue comme profondément thérapeutique.
Méditation et présence attentive : étude comparée de pratiques de consciences en Asie et en France
Authors: Hamard Albin , Chenault Marceau
Published: January 2018

L’objectif de cet article est de comparer diverses pratiques méditatives en Asie et en France afin de caractériser les dénominateurs communs et les variations de ces pratiques de consciences. Les auteurs s’appuient sur une ethnographie multi-site : des monastères en Himalaya bouddhiste, un institut de médecine traditionnelle en Chine, des ermitages et centres de méditation tibétains en France, ainsi que des immersions dans des formations françaises à la MBSR et au qigong. L’observation de la méditation dans ces contextes variés amène à distinguer selon les sites des pratiques, des techniques et des gestes intérieurs distincts. L’analyse conduit aussi à identifier quatre types de pratiques méditatives : concentrative, ouverte, introspective, non orientée. Ces résultats offrent des éléments de réflexion intéressants sur la transformation des pratiques méditatives en Europe et leur intégration dans les milieux éducatifs ou de santé. Il s’agit finalement de contribuer à l’émergence de nouvelles pistes conceptuelles par l’étude des techniques et pratiques de conscience.
Ethical Data Management and Research Integrity in the Context of E-Schools and Community Engagement
Authors: Goosen Leilani
Published: January 2018

The purpose of this chapter is to build on the existing literature in the field of research methodology, specifically as applicable in terms of ethical data management and research integrity, and especially in the context of e-schools and community engagement. This chapter should also enable readers to understand why ethics is important in research relating to e-schools and community engagement. Finally, the author identifies other elements critical to the responsible conduct of research in areas such as those of e-schools and community engagement. The chapter thus provides the reader with an overview of ethical issues in quantitative and qualitative data collection and guidelines for such data processing.
Data Documentation and Informed Consent in Research
Authors: Terry Dzever Linus , Amudalat Esan Adepeju
Published: January 2018

This chapter examines data documentation and informed consent in research. The exercise of documenting data provides an opportunity for researchers to reflect on a study to guide current work and inform and enhance future research. The chapter explains data documentation, how data is created or digitized, what data mean, what their content and structure are and any data manipulations that may have taken place, specific steps for documenting data-based research beginning with the study design and ending with data analysis and guidelines for obtaining informed consent, developing culturally appropriate methods of sharing information for research purpose and discusses prevailing views on current controversies, ambiguities and problems with these guidelines and suggests potential solutions. The literature also includes many references to the need for data documentation and informed consent. Further research is needed to examine the validity and user friendliness of innovations in information sharing procedures for obtaining consent in different cultural settings.
Ensuring Research Integrity and the Ethical Management of Data
Authors: Ekejiuba Paulette Ngozi , Agwubike Elias Okechukwu
Published: January 2018

The purpose of this chapter is to ensure research integrity and the ethical management of data in Nigerian tertiary educational institutions. Research as a process concerns three scopes relating to examination/inquiry, finding, and application. In Nigerian universities, only two dimensions of research are in use, observation/inquiry and discovery. Consequently, there is lack of transfer of knowledge to the society through the visible creation of new technology products, processes, or even the development of the existing ones. More often than not, however, when attempts are made by students and lecturers in Nigerian tertiary educational institutions to engage in research conduct, writings, and publications, chains of unethical issues and actions are involved or practiced. It is the consideration of some of such unethical behaviors, their consequences, and how data are managed that the present chapter reveals.
Striving Toward Biliteracy in Mainstream, English as a Second Language, and Bilingual Classrooms
Authors: Vehabovic Nermin , Paul Casey Medlock
Published: January 2018

The development of biliteracy among English language learners (ELLs) has been established as a critical issue in education policy and practice. We live in an era of increasing globalization, which results in increased numbers of immigrants in the United States. As a result, significant proportions of students in U.S. schools come from homes where English is not used as the primary language; however, these students, as emergent bilinguals, are required to navigate language and culture in mainstream, English as a Second Language, and bilingual classrooms contexts. This chapter considers the challenges that emergent bilingual students face in elementary school contexts. In addition, specific research-based strategies are outlined for teachers working with ELLs in mainstream, English as a Second Language, or bilingual classrooms. Lastly, the authors explore how multiliteracy approaches and pedagogy might shape ELLs' identity formation.
Building Academic Language Through Innovation
Authors: Judkins Brandy C. , Falls Zoe
Published: January 2018

Academic language instruction, exposure, and proficiency are increasingly the focus of research, curricula, and pedagogy within the field of English language teaching. Yet, academic language is more than lexicon, encompassing context-specific and content-driven spoken and written discourse in a large range of registers, each with its own quirks, features, and discourse patterns. We must, then, engage students in developing and practicing academic language in authentic communicative experiences—experiences we may have limited time to add to the curriculum. Thus, innovative approaches to these experiences are needed. Consequently, the aim of this chapter is to present one such innovative approach: incorporating making, tinkering, and collaborating into the classroom. Direct connections between communicative language teaching and the theoretical grounding of making in the classroom are highlighted, in addition to specific pedagogical advice and examples that empower language teachers to purposefully teach with a maker's mind.
Dimensions of Success Integrating the C3 Framework and ESL Instruction
Authors: Barko-Alva Katherine , Masyada Stephen S.
Published: January 2018

This chapter provides a theoretical foundation for considering how the four dimensions of the C3 (i.e., college, career, and civic life) framework may be used as a means to provide English language learners (ELLs) with equitable access to academic language and content instruction within the context of an elementary social studies classroom. In addition, this chapter offers insight in preparing students, especially ELLs, for the demands of civic life. The authors approach this discussion by narratively modeling a lesson plan targeting a second grade, ESL, social studies classroom. This chapter seeks to integrate research-based practices within both the social studies and ESL frameworks while illustrating the feasibility of using the C3 framework to serve the needs of culturally and linguistically diverse student populations.
Impact of Pharmaceutical and Mining Industrial Wastes on Natural Reservoirs in Goa and Its Microbial-Based Solution
Authors: Shekh Mohammad Raeesh , Ahemad Mohammad Nasir , Singh Pawan Kumar
Published: January 2018

Table salt is essential for metabolism of human being. These salt crystals are produced in saltpans of high salinity natural reservoirs, affiliated to sea water through evaporation process. Arabian Sea makes its boundary with Goa as its western coast helps in salt production. The pharmaceutical and acid mine drainage generated by nearly located iron mines are continuously destructing the natural reservoirs, agricultural lands, flora and fauna. Local people are affected by the muddy water, passing trucks with mined minerals into their farms or agricultural land and continuously decreasing the fertility of the soil. The aim of this chapter is to focus on the present scenario of the ecosystem, salt pans and flora and fauna in relation to pharmaceutical and mining waste and impact of this pollution on local people. Microbial based monitoring and cleanup strategy of the present polluted bodies, are also discussed in this chapter.
Removal of Toxic Pollutants From Soil Using Microbial Biotechnology
Authors: Pandey Anupam , Tripathi Priyanka Harishchandra , Pandey Satish Chandra , Pathak Vinay Mohan , Nailwal Tapan Kumar
Published: January 2018

At present the many of the man-made compounds released in soil by various ways. These compounds might be pesticides and other hazardous chemicals. Through food chain these compounds increased day by day at particular trophic level and also affect the soil biodiversity. Microbial cultures and associated biotechnology can be helpful to reduce such types of pollution from soil without affecting their natural habitat or niche. In this chapter we will discuss the indigenous microbial flora and their role for the maintenance of the sustainable environment.
Green Chemistry
Authors: Mishra Prakash Chandra , Giri Anil Kumar
Published: January 2018

Our environment needs to be protected from ever-increasing chemical pollution. Advances in science and technology can address the challenges of global environmental sustainability, which includes the release of persistent organic pollutants, climate change, and bioaccumulation of contaminants, endocrine disruption and ozone depletion. Achieving sustainability requires an intricate balance among resource use, economic growth and environmental impact. Green chemistry is a growing field of research where pollution is reduced by designing and developing chemical products/process addresses. Many of these are concerned by combining the critical elements of environmental improvement, economic competitiveness and social responsibility. In this chapter the scope for the development of green chemistry and the beneficial aspects have been discussed stressing future research.
Mechanisms of Action of Nanoparticles in Living Systems
Authors: Rawat Madhu , Yadukrishnan P.  , Kumar Nitin
Published: January 2018

Nanoparticles are being formed continuously in processes like mineralization, natural calamities, and geological recycling of matter and present naturally in the environment. In the recent past, nanoparticles and their applications have become an extensive topic of research. Application of nanomaterials in different industries will surely enhance the chances of discharge of nanoparticles into the environment. So, a number of studies have been performed to explore the mode of action of nanoparticles on living organisms and their surroundings. The most reported modes of action of nanoparticles are antimicrobial activity, ROS-induced cytotoxicity, genotoxicity, plant growth promotion, etc. It has been successfully demonstrated that actions of nanoparticles are governed by their size, shape, dose, and concentration. However, a complete mechanism of action of nanoparticles has not been known. The present chapter focuses on the highlights of the mechanisms behind the mode of action of nanoparticles in plants and microorganisms.
Phytoremediation
Authors: Bhandari Geeta
Published: January 2018

Environmental pollution with xenobiotics is a global problem and development of inventive remediation technologies for the decontamination of impacted sites are therefore of paramount importance. Phytoremediation capitalizes on plant systems for removal of pollutants from the environment. Phytoremediation is a low maintenance remediation strategy and less destructive than physical or chemical remediation. Phytoremediation may occur directly through uptake, translocation into plant shoots and metabolism (phytodegradation) or volatilization (phytovolatilization) or indirectly through plant-microbe-contaminant interactions within plant root zones (rhizospheres). In recent years, researchers have engineered plants with genes that can bestow superior degradation abilities. Thus, phytoremediation can be more explored, demonstrated, and/or implemented for the cleanup of metal contaminants, inorganic pollutants, and organic contaminants.
Overcoming the Difficulties Associated With Using Conceptual and Theoretical Frameworks in Heritage Studies
Authors: Ngulube Patrick
Published: January 2018

This chapter discusses the use of conceptual and theoretical frameworks in social science research with a focus on heritage studies. Incorporating theory or developing a conceptual framework is a critical part of the research design process. It assists in explaining the issue under study and refining the research questions. Linking theory and empirical constructs is fundamental to both quantitative and qualitative research, although some studies suggest that this is something that a number of researchers in the latter research tradition tend to ignore. Theories provide a theoretical framework for conceptualising research. Without a theoretical or a conceptual framework, the analysis of the findings results in a mere narration. Many researchers encounter difficulties in distinguishing between and using a conceptual framework and a theoretical framework as research tools. There are recurring doubts about their utility in the research endeavour and how one might select a good theory. Consequently, there is limited engagement with theory.
The Scope and Appetite for Technology-Assisted Sensitivity Reviewing of Born-Digital Records in a Resource Poor Environment
Authors: Tough Alistair G.
Published: January 2018

Concerns about sensitive content in born-digital records seem to be a major factor in inhibiting the deposit of public records in dedicated digital repositories in Western countries. These concerns are much exacerbated by the changed nature of the process of reviewing records. The University of Glasgow, working in collaboration with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, received funding to investigate the technology-assisted sensitivity reviewing of born-digital records. As part of this research, some preliminary research in a commonwealth country in Sub-Saharan Africa was carried out. The research, reported in this chapter, was carried out in Malawi by the late Dr. Mathews J. Phiri. He found that already there is a real, albeit limited, demand for technology-assisted sensitivity reviewing of born-digital records in Malawi. The available evidence suggests that within the next decade there is likely to be an increase in the need for effective means of assessing sensitivity in born-digital records.
Environmental Consideration in the Preservation of Paper Materials in Heritage Institutions in the East and Southern African Region
Authors: Segaetsho Thatayaone
Published: January 2018

Heritage institutions, especially in developing countries throughout the world, have difficulties in achieving ideal environmental conditions in the preservation of paper materials. Concerns exist about improving environmental conditions in heritage institutions considering the limited storage facilities and resources in most developing countries in Africa. This chapter redefines suitable strategies for various environmental factors impacting preservation in heritage institutions in the East and Southern African Region. The chapter discusses effective activities, environmental factors, and explores knowledge and skills required for achieving ideal storage conditions. Furthermore, it discusses the key challenges of maintaining ideal and constant environmental conditions for paper-based materials particularly in developing countries where resources are limited. The chapter concludes by providing a recommendation of an environmental conditions management framework that can be used to effectively manage environmental conditions in heritage institutions.
Multi-Criteria Decision Making for Optimization of Product Development Under Green Manufacturing Environment
Authors: Bhowmik Sumit , Jagadish
Published: January 2018

At present, increasing environmental awareness and stringent environmental regulations of the competent authority, the use of green manufacturing (GM) technique is an important topic for the present industries. To overcome the environmental issues, the manufacturing industries use various advanced manufacturing processes for optimal product development. The advance manufacturing process generates large amounts of toxic substances results in various environmental issues during the optimal product manufacturing. Minimization of environmental issues and the amount of waste generated are strongly depends on its process and response parameters. Thus, optimization of process parameters for GM is essential and is a multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) optimization problems. This chapter provides an overview of applications of some MCDM methods for optimization followed by detailed fundamental aspects of optimization issues in green manufacturing. The work proposed an integrated method consisting of AHP coupled with MOORA and validated through an experimental case study.
The Influence of Culture on the Adoption of Green IT
Authors: Campbell William M. , Moore Philip , Ratcliffe Martyn , Sharma Mak
Published: January 2018

This chapter addresses the impact of organizational culture on the adoption of Green IT initiatives. We begin by exploring organizational culture and consider the nature of culture within the IT sector. An analysis of the effect of culture on sustainable use of IT is presented using Cameron and Quinn's Competing Values Framework as a tool to explore organizational culture. A major theme of this Chapter is the use of choice architectures to ‘nudge' individuals in particular directions with a focus on adopting green IT policies. Other themes explored are the roles social media play in promoting green IT and the impact of culture on the use of tools which deliver green IT including cloud computing and context-aware systems. We consider the impact of globalization. Key recommendations for working with culture to support the adoption of green IT are provided.
Culture Influence on IT Governance
Authors: Aasi Parisa , Rusu Lazar , Han Shengnan
Published: January 2018

Managers face enormous challenges today to plan the decision rights and responsibilities in order to reach desired IT behaviors which are aligned with business objectives of organizations. This is known as IT governance and is ranked as one of the firms' top concerns. Not surprisingly, it is crucial for organizations to find the affecting factors on IT governance and solve the problems associated with it. Culture in national, organizational or group level is an affecting factor in organizations that can play a role in IT governance and this role is rarely explored in academic research. This paper provides a literature review investigating the influence of culture on IT governance. The research purpose is to identify how culture and IT governance in the companies can be linked together and promote this area for future research. The literature review is done systematically and the findings are classified by using an IT governance framework with three main components of structures, processes and relational mechanisms. The results indicate there is an influence from national and organizational culture on IT governance. However, the number of studies is very few and there is still a lack of knowledge on how culture can influence IT governance. This research calls upon a further research on culture impact on achieving an effective IT governance implementation in organizations.
Modeling Choice Between Competing Technologies
Authors: Aguirre-Urreta Miguel I. , Marakas George M.
Published: January 2018

Even though there is a rich and extensive literature on the individual adoption of technologies, limited attention has been placed on the choice of one among competing alternatives, which the authors posit as an essential antecedent to the individual acceptance decision that has been considered in the past. In this chapter, they compare two levels at which the choice can be made—expectations and intentions—and then review and contrast four different comparison mechanisms that can integrate the evaluations made at each level as predictive of actual choice. These were investigated by asking business professionals to assess and evaluate technologies for potential adoption within their domain of expertise, and then a second study was conducted to further validate the results thus obtained. The authors also extensively discuss the implications of this research for future work on the processes leading to adoption of information technologies.
Exploration of Faculty's Perceptions on Technology Change
Authors: Outlaw Veronica , Rice Margaret L. , Wright Vivian H.
Published: January 2018

This chapter conveys the results of an original research study conducted in 2013-2014 to analyze the perceptions of faculty during a learning management system transition (frequent technology change or adoption). The purpose of the study is to determine if faculty perceptions of adopting new technology have an effect on their stress levels; thereby, affecting faculty preparedness. The literature indicates that higher Technological Self-Efficacy (TSE) should result in lower stress levels. Data analysis reveals faculty who indicated having moderate proficiency of TSE (45%) and possessing moderate stress levels (45%); having somewhat proficiency of TSE (27%) and possessing minor stress levels (32%); and having extreme proficiency of TSE (20%), yet possessing serious stress levels (14%). While these findings differ from other current literature findings, the literature does support the notion that higher stress levels have implications on faculty perceptions, behaviors, and preparedness (Iqbal & Kokash, 2011).
Interplay of Technology and Customer Value Dynamics in Banking Industry
Authors: Rajagopal  , Rajagopal Ananya
Published: January 2018

This chapter attempts to critically examine the available literature on the subject, discuss a model that provides a framework for analyzing the variables associated with customer value, and to identify potential research areas. The chapter argues through a set of linear equations that maximizing customer value which is interdependent factor for technology adoption and profit optimization in the banks need to be backed with appropriate economic parameters for attaining competitive efficiency and optimizing profit. The framework of the construct is laid on the theory of competitive advantage and customer lifetime value, so as to maximize the potential of the organization and all its subsystems to create and sustain satisfied customers. The theoretical impetus from new technologies in banking services such as mobile banking in the North American region and discusses the technology led marketing process towards optimizing profit have been discussed in this chapter. The discussion in the paper also analyzes the main criteria for successful internet-banking strategy and brings out benefits of e-banking from the point of view of banks, their technology and customer values and tentatively concludes that there is increasing returns to scale in the bank services in relation to the banking products, new technology and customer value.
A Qualitative Study of Green IT Adoption Within the Philippines Business Process Outsourcing Industry
Authors: Hernandez Alexander A. , Ona Sherwin
Published: January 2018

This study explores the green IT adoption experience of organizations within the business process outsourcing industry in the Philippines using a multi-theory perspective. Through a multiple case study with three organizations, it presents a holistic account of the factors in green IT adoption. This study shows the usefulness of complementarily deploying adoption theory and offers important theoretical and practical implications for organizations as they extend their BPO operations globally. In this study, the authors discovered that technological and organizational context factors have greater positive impact on Green IT adoption within BPO organizations while environmental context factors have lesser impact in decision-making processes.
Cultural Orientation Differences and Their Implications for Online Learning Satisfaction
Authors: Tankari Moussa
Published: January 2018

The purpose of this chapter, which uses sociocultural learning theory as its framework and a mixed-methods study design, is to understand the differences between personal culture orientation and online learning satisfaction by examining culture at the macro and micro level in an online learning environment. More specifically, this chapter examines the cultural orientation differences among graduate students enrolled in at least one online course in the fall of 2011 at a Western institution of higher education and how these cultural differences impact their level of satisfaction with online learning. Both quantitative and qualitative data is collected, respectively, via surveys, and interviews indicate that, although culture does not directly affect satisfaction, there is a need to raise awareness about the critical factors that may affect online learning experience and to provide guidance for practice and future research.
Understanding the Mediation Effect of Cloud Computing Adoption in Indian Organization
Authors: Raut Rakesh , Priyadarshinee Pragati , Jha Manoj
Published: January 2018

The aim of this paper is to measure the business performance by taking Cloud computing adoption as a mediating variable in Indian industries. A conceptual model is framed using the concept of a TAM-TOE framework which is combined with some new constructs of ‘Risk'. Partial and full mediation are used from the umbrella concept of SEM (Structural Equation Modelling) to test the hypotheses. The study identified that Technological variables ‘Technology Innovation (TI)' and ‘Usage of Technology (UT)' positively mediates the relationship, Organizational variable ‘Industry Usage (IU)' negatively mediates the relationship and Environmental variables ‘Management Style (MS)' positively mediates the relationship whereas ‘Trust (T)' has no mediation effect. The ‘Risk' factors ‘Risk Analysis (RA)' positively influences the mediation process and ‘Perceived IT Security Risk (PITR)' has no mediation effect on the dependent variable ‘Business performance (BP)'. The findings of the study have some important implications. As the constructs ‘Risk (Perceived IT Security Risk)' and ‘Trust' have no mediation effect, it implies industries do not give importance on these factors while adopting Cloud computing. Hence, risk and trust resulted as the barriers for technology adoption, and organizations should verify these criteria during Cloud computing adoption of a better performance in the business. The study tests indirect effect and direct effect on business performance considering Cloud computing adoption as the mediating variable.
Dynamic Analysis of UTAUT
Authors: Abualbasal Wejdan , Abu-Shanab Emad , Al-Quraan Heba
Published: January 2018

The technology adoption domain is rich with studies that utilized a cross-sectional snapshot of subjects' perceptions regarding the adoption of new technology. This research tried to implement a longitudinal study that took three measures within 4 months to estimate the influence of time and experience on students' perceptions. The study adopted a modified version of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and use of Technology (UTAUT) with effort expectancy, performance expectancy, facilitating conditions, and locus of control predicting the intention to use Microsoft Project. Results supported the UTAUT and its prediction. Also, this study fitted two types of dynamic research typologies (learning curve and equilibrium circles) to the UTAUT relationships and across time.
On the Efficiency of Grey Modeling in Early-Stage Technological Diffusion Forecasting
Authors: Christodoulos Charisios , Michalakelis Christos , Sphicopoulos Thomas
Published: January 2018

The issue of how to obtain an accurate short-term forecast in the beginning stage of the technological diffusion is of great importance for policy makers, researchers and managers. Time-series forecasting has been noticeably neglected in the specific research area due to the prerequisite of having enough data in order to create a time-series. In this paper, Grey modeling is examined as an alternative tool for technology diffusion forecasting in the early diffusion process, where the commonly used aggregate diffusion models usually fail to deliver accurate forecasts. Grey modeling is a unique time-series methodology that requires only a few data points in order to make a forecast. The GM(1,1) model is tested against a classic aggregate diffusion model, the Gompertz model, using only the first four data of mobile broadband diffusion to make an one-step-ahead prediction. The results in the EU15 countries reveal that the Grey model outperforms the Gompertz model in every case, thus stimulating new research guidelines in terms of combinations of the two approaches and further investigation of the value of Grey modeling in the specific area.
Review of ICT Adoption Research in Arabic Countries
Authors: Halaweh Mohanad
Published: January 2018

Information systems (IS) researchers have intensively investigated information and communication technology (ICT) adoption. However, very little research has analyzed ICT adoption in the Arab region. This paper aims to review research related to ICT adoption in the Arab world to identify the current state of this research area and provide direction for future research. Fifty articles that addressed ICT adoption in three Arabic countries, namely United Arab Emirates (UAE), Jordan, and Egypt, were found and selected for review. These articles were analyzed based on a research framework that included eight elements: the selected Arabic countries, applied theoretical models, adoption factors, type of adopted ICT, applied research methods, level of adoption, publication year, and quality of publications (i.e. journals ranking). This paper discusses the current trends of ICT adoption research in the Arab region based on the findings of this analysis and provides two main directions for future research: conceptual and theoretical research development and methodological research.
A Multimethod Study of Enterprise Social Media Implementation and Use
Authors: Bala Hillol , Massey Anne P. , Hsieh Christine J.
Published: January 2018

Enterprise social media (ESM) are web-based platforms dedicated to corporate-based communication and collaboration. Although the practitioner literature and industry reports have suggested the potential value of ESM for organizations, there has been limited research that focuses on employees' reactions to ESM implementation and their post-implementation use behaviors. The authors conducted a mixed methods study of a large-scale ESM implementation in a Fortune 500 manufacturing company and found that widely used IT adoption models and determinants failed to explain employees' ESM use. To help explain this paradoxical finding, the authors leveraged their qualitative data and found several major challenges, both internal and external, that the company faced during ESM implementation. Their findings have a number of generalizable lessons for practice as well as implications for research.
Adoption of Mobile Devices in the Australian Healthcare
Authors: Sood Vasundhara Rani , Gururajan Raj , Hafeez-Baig Abdul , Wickramasinghe Nilmini
Published: January 2018

In recent years, the potential use of mobile devices has significantly positively impacted healthcare globally. Despite global claims of widespread use of mobile devices in healthcare, its adoption in the Australian healthcare context is slow. Limited research is available on slow adoption of mobile devices in the Australian healthcare context. Therefore, this chapter is designed to investigate the factors influencing adoption of mobile devices from healthcare professionals' perspective and develop a health specific conceptual framework. The influential factors for the adoption of mobile devices in the Australian health context may be intention, individual readiness, advantages, safety issues, features, self-efficacy, complexity, training, compatibility, social influences, age and gender.
Strategies to Support the Faculty Adoption of Technology for Student Success Initiatives
Authors: Collins Phyllis K. Brooks
Published: January 2018

Faculty members have a key role in helping students to navigate through the academic requirements for their chosen degree program. As the call for more institutional accountability increases across the higher education landscape, retaining and graduating students becomes critical for institutions. Technology has been touted as the solution to alleviate the problem by adopting more efficient ways of improving and monitoring student success. Historically, the faculty's primary focus was to teach, engage in research and service with limited oversight and full autonomy. This chapter will examine strategies to facilitate and support the faculty adoption of technology as it pertains to student success initiatives. The author will discuss the types of faculty and their responsibilities, the barriers institutions face to faculty participation and how to motivate faculty to adopt technology to support student success. Finally, selected strategies for successful faculty adoptions that will support student success initiatives and programs will be reviewed.
Engineering the Services of the Library through Mobile Technology
Authors: Mtshali Eunice
Published: January 2018

Many universities are struggling to response the needs of its users. This is attributed to the rapid change in technological innovations. The growing interest on mobile technology in organisations is at a fast pace, particularly in institutions of higher learning. Mobile technology could be used in academic libraries to provide a better service to their clients or improve the service that they currently provide. Case study research was conducted at Capital University to understand the factors that could influence and impact the adoption of mobile technology in academic library services.
Technological Innovation and Adoptive Ability
Authors: Alexiadis Stilianos , Kokkinou Aikaterini , Ladias Christos
Published: January 2018

This chapter develops a model of sustainable regional growth that encapsulates the impact of infrastructure in the adoptive ability of a region. An implication of this model is that convergence towards technologically leading regions is feasible only for regions with sufficient absorptive capacity.
OCTAPACE Human Resource Development Culture Impact on Bank Performance
Authors: Mahapatra Jyotirmaya , Kumar Dinesh
Published: January 2018

Initiation of economic reforms in India overwhelmed the large banks starting in 1991. Liberlaisation, privatisation, and globalisation, along with foreign direct investment exposed Indian banks to operational and credit risks. To overcome these risks, the banks have upgraded their financial, technological, and Human Resource Development (HRD) processes. The case study organization was one of the nationalized banks in India that lost its supremacy, slipping in rank from first to eighth. During the last decade, this bank adopted several HRD practices to create a strong OCTAPACE culture. As a result, the bank won several HRD awards over 10 years. This study critically reviews that bank as a single case study. Data were collected from 153 employees of the case study bank (all had completed at least 10 years of service). The focus was to examine if the OCTAPACE culture had impacted performance. The findings were that the OCTAPACE culture improved and the bank increased its financial performance without experiencing credit risk.
User Acceptance of Computer Technology at Work in Arabian Culture
Authors: Hu Han-fen , Hu Paul Jen-Hwa , Al-Gahtani Said S.
Published: January 2018

User acceptance of computer technology in work environments could differ from that of general consumer contexts. Toward that end, cultural considerations could affect individuals' behaviors, including their technology acceptance. This study analyzes the acceptance of computer technology by 1,088 workers in an Arabian country to reexamine and compare established models and theories to prior studies in the Western, developed countries. The explanatory power of each theory or model seems lower among Arabian workers. The innovation diffusion theory (IDT) appears capable of explaining workers' technology acceptance better than the theory of planned behavior (TPB) or technology acceptance model (TAM) does. Perceived behavioral control and subjective norms constitute more important acceptance determinants than attitude does. Both perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use remain significant determinants of attitude and intention; however, considering findings reported by previous research, their total effects are comparable in magnitude and statistical significance. The findings are incongruent with the results of several representative prior studies that examine the same theories and models. The results can be partially explained by the unique socio-cultural characteristics and overall technology development status of the country. In turn, these results offer several implications for studying worker's technology acceptance in developing countries with a unique cultural context.
The Holon/Parton Theory of the Unit of Culture (or the Meme, and Narreme)
Authors: Velikovsky J. T.
Published: January 2018

A universal problem in the disciplines of communication, creativity, philosophy, biology, psychology, sociology, anthropology, archaeology, history, linguistics, information science, cultural studies, literature, media and other domains of knowledge in both the arts and sciences has been the definition of ‘culture' (see Kroeber & Kluckhohn, 1952; Baldwin et al., 2006), including the specification of ‘the unit of culture', and, mechanisms of culture. This chapter proposes a theory of the unit of culture, or, the ‘meme' (Dawkins, 1976; Dennett, 1995; Blackmore, 1999), a unit which is also the narreme (Barthes, 1966), or ‘unit of story', or ‘unit of narrative'. The holon/parton theory of the unit of culture (Velikovsky, 2014) is a consilient (Wilson, 1998) synthesis of (Koestler, 1964, 1967, 1978) and Feynman (1975, 2005) and also the Evolutionary Systems Theory model of creativity (Csikszentmihalyi, 1988-2014; Simonton, 1984-2014). This theory of the unit of culture potentially has applications across all creative cultural domains and disciplines in the sciences, arts and communication media.
Developing and Measuring the Business Case for Health Information Technology
Authors: Unwin Duncan Wade , Sanzogni Louis , Sandhu Kuldeep
Published: January 2018

This chapter examines the adoption of information technology and information systems to support the clinical process. It explores popular models of information systems adoption and success, and relates these to the health it context. The end result of successful adoption of technology should be the improvement in performance of health care delivery, yet measurement of performance is complex. The various approaches to performance measurement are discussed. As one of the challenges in predicting the outcomes of adoption is the lack of consistent taxonomy, a solution to which is proposed. The chapter then looks at evaluation of it projects and considers what special factors may affect health it adoption and benefits in developing health care systems.
Recent Advances in Feature Extraction and Description Algorithms
Authors: Salahat Ehab Najeh , Qasaimeh Murad
Published: January 2018

Computer vision is one of the most active research fields in technology today. Giving machines the ability to see and comprehend the world at the speed of sight creates endless applications and opportunities. Feature detection and description algorithms are considered as the retina for machine vision. However, most of these algorithms are typically computationally intensive, which prevents them from achieving real-time performance. As such, embedded vision accelerators (FPGA, ASIC, etc.) can be targeted due to their inherent parallelizability. This chapter provides a comprehensive study on some of the recent feature detection and description algorithms and their hardware solutions. Specifically, it begins with a synopsis on basic concepts followed by a comparative study, from which the maximally stable extremal regions (MSER) and the scale invariant feature transform (SIFT) algorithms are selected for further analysis due to their robust performance. The chapter then reports some of their recent algorithmic derivatives and highlights their recent hardware designs and architectures.
Detecting Significant Changes in Image Sequences
Authors: Mashtalir Sergii , Mikhnova Olena
Published: January 2018

In this chapter the authors propose an overview on contemporary artificial intelligence techniques designed for change detection in image and video sequences. A variety of image features have been analyzed for content presentation at a low level. In attempt towards high-level interpretation by a machine, a novel approach to image comparison has been proposed and described in detail. It utilizes techniques of salient point detection, video scene identification, spatial image segmentation, feature extraction and analysis. Metrics implemented for image partition matching enhance performance and quality of the results, which has been proved by several estimations. The review on estimation measures is also given along with references to publicly available test datasets. Conclusion is provided in relation to trends of future development in image and video processing.
Recent Survey on Medical Image Segmentation
Authors: Salem Mohammed A.-M. , Atef Alaa , Salah Alaa , Shams Marwa
Published: January 2018

This chapter presents a survey on the techniques of medical image segmentation. Image segmentation methods are given in three groups based on image features used by the method. The advantages and disadvantages of the existing methods are evaluated, and the motivations to develop new techniques with respect to the addressed problems are given. Digital images and digital videos are pictures and films, respectively, which have been converted into a computer-readable binary format consisting of logical zeros and ones. An image is a still picture that does not change in time, whereas a video evolves in time and generally contains moving and/or changing objects. An important feature of digital images is that they are multidimensional signals, i.e., they are functions of more than a single variable. In the classical study of the digital signal processing the signals are usually one-dimensional functions of time. Images however, are functions of two, and perhaps three space dimensions in case of colored images, whereas a digital video as a function includes a third (or fourth) time dimension as well. A consequence of this is that digital image processing, meaning that significant computational and storage resources are required.
Transform Domain Techniques for Image Steganography
Authors: Singh Siddharth , Siddiqui Tanveer J.
Published: January 2018

Recent advancement of multimedia technology has posed serious challenges to copyright protection, ownership, and integrity of digital data. This has made information security techniques a vital issue. Cryptography, Steganography, and Watermarking are three major techniques for securing information and ensuring copyright ownership. This chapter presents an overview of transform domain techniques for image steganography. The authors discuss the characteristics and applications of image steganography and briefly review Discrete Cosine and Wavelet transform-based image steganography techniques. They also discuss the various metrics that have been used to assess the performance of steganography techniques and shed light on the future of steganography.