ghanaopendata/ghanaian-research-english huggingface dataset:
Mobile learning behaviour of university students in Ghana

Abstract: This study was planned to investigate the effect of distance education students’ attitudinal, social, and control beliefs on their mobile learning usage at the University of Ghana and the University of Education, Winneba. The Decomposed Theory of Planned Behaviour (DTPB) was modified to explain how students’ attitude, subjective norms, and behavioural control of mobile learning influenced their current mobile learning usage. The study used an explanatory sequential mixed-method approach. Congruent to that, structured questionnaires were administered to 400 distance learners selected by multi-stage sampling technique, and 20 distance learners selected by random sampling technique were interviewed via phone to collect data. Using correlation and multiple linear regression analysis, as well as hypothesis testing, the findings showed that, the university students’ attitudes towards mobile learning, subjective norms, and behavioral control insignificantly influenced their ongoing mobile usage thus providing meek support for the research model. However, it was found that university students’ mobile learning innovativeness, peer influence, and self-efficacy significantly affect their attitudes, subjective norms, and behavioral control respectively of their mobile learning usage. This supports the research model and can be inferred that university students’ mobile learning innovativeness, peer influence, and self-efficacy indirectly influence their mobile learning usage. The results of this study will enable educational institutions to engage in better strategic planning and implementation of mobile learning on a wider scale focusing on students’ behavioral, social, and control factors.

Source: UG
Mobile money adoption and spending behaviour: the case of students in Ghana

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the use of the mobile money technology among students affects their spending behaviour. Design/methodology/approach The study reports interesting findings by using a random sample of 506 students from the University of Ghana and applying ordinary least squares regression technique. Findings The findings suggest that active use of mobile money services has significant influence on students spending behaviour. On a monthly basis, students who use mobile money spend on the average 20 Ghana Cedis more than their colleagues who do not use mobile money. Students who use both mobile money and ATMs jointly spend nearly 13 Ghana Cedis more than their counterparts who use either of them. Social implications The implication of this finding is that mobile money technology which provides easy access to money can increase spending behaviour of students and reduce the tendency of savings. The authors therefore conclude that although technological growth should not be curtailed given the numerous benefits technology accrues to society, its use must be controlled, in particular, when it comes to using it as a medium of exchange so as to minimize the negative influences (such as indiscriminate spending). Originality/value This paper studies the post-adoption behavioural responses of mobile money users particularly among students in Africa which is rare in the literature.

Source: UG
Mobile money taxation and informal workers: Evidence from Ghana's E-levy

Motivation: In recent years, governments in low-income countries have increasingly introduced taxes on mobile money transfers. These are often explicitly promoted as a way of taxing informal economic activity, but critics have noted their potential negative impact on lower income groups and specifically those in the informal sector. Yet there is virtually no evidence base on the effects of mobile money taxes on informal workers. Purpose: This article assesses how informal workers in Accra, Ghana, use mobile money and how they perceive Ghana's Electronic Transfer Levy (E-levy), introduced in May 2022. This provides a particularly interesting case study to explore the equity implications of the tax, as the policy was explicitly justified as a way of taxing the informal economy but also includes measures to limit the tax burden on lower income groups. Methods and approach: The article uses data from a survey of 2,700 self-employed informal workers in the Accra Metropolitan Assembly to capture citizen perceptions of the policy and to examine the likely impact of the E-levy on informal workers with reference to equity. Findings: Overall, our results suggest that the E-levy is highly regressive. Further, we show that most informal workers disapprove of the E-levy, reflecting not just concerns about its equity impacts, but also disappointment with the government's performance. Policy implications: Our findings suggest that taxes on digital financial services should be reconsidered from an equity perspective. While some policy measures, including those undertaken in Ghana, can protect low-income earners, they are often insufficient to counteract overall regressive impacts. Where they are implemented, social spending from the revenue from these taxes should target low-income populations in the informal economy, while governments should focus on building trust among informal workers with regard to revenue raising and spending

Source: UG
Mobile money: a gateway to achieving financial inclusion in Ghana

While emerging studies on mobile financial inclusion have focused on the factors driving the adoption of mobile money, little evidence exists on how the service is facilitating the use of formal financial services. Using the World Bank Findex data, we estimate the effect of mobile money adoption on the use of formal accounts, savings, and credit in Ghana. The results of the recursive bivariate probit analysis showed a significant symbiotic relationship between mobile money adoption and the probability of operating a formal account. Mobile money adoption has a positive effect on savings and access to credit but does not affect the avenues to savings and obtaining credit, respectively. Mobile money users save in their wallet and obtain microcredit through the mobile money platform but not through formal channels. These findings reinforce the hypothesis that mobile money is the surest financial tool for achieving universal financial inclusion in developing countries.

Source: UG
A mobile phone based tool to identify symptoms of common childhood diseases in Ghana: Development and evaluation of the integrated clinical algorithm in a cross-sectional study

Background: The aim of this study was the development and evaluation of an algorithm-based diagnosis-tool, applicable on mobile phones, to support guardians in providing appropriate care to sick children. Methods: The algorithm was developed on the basis of the Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI) guidelines and evaluated at a hospital in Ghana. Two hundred and thirty-seven guardians applied the tool to assess their child's symptoms. Data recorded by the tool and health records completed by a physician were compared in terms of symptom detection, disease assessment and treatment recommendation. To compare both assessments, Kappa statistics and predictive values were calculated. Results: The tool detected the symptoms of cough, fever, diarrhoea and vomiting with good agreement to the physicians' findings (kappa = 0.64; 0.59; 0.57 and 0.42 respectively). The disease assessment barely coincided with the physicians' findings. The tool's treatment recommendation correlated with the physicians' assessments in 93 out of 237 cases (39.2% agreement, kappa = 0.11), but underestimated a child's condition in only seven cases (3.0%). Conclusions: The algorithm-based tool achieved reliable symptom detection and treatment recommendations were administered conformably to the physicians' assessment. Testing in domestic environment is envisaged.

Source: UG
Mobile Phone Usage Among Senior High and Technical School Students in Ghana and Its Impact on Academic Outcomes – A Case Study

There are currently over 7.6 billion mobile phone connections in the world, which is approximately equivalent to the world’s population; as if to say that everyone in the world is hooked up to mobile telephony. By the next decade, it is estimated that the number of mobile phone subscribers would increase by a billion with 90% of this growth coming from developing countries. This exponential growth coupled with its ubiquity highlights its essentiality in all spheres of human endeavour. Despite the fact that many sectors in developing countries worldwide are embracing its usage as an effective tool, the Ghana Education Service (GES) has placed a ban on the use of mobile phones in senior high schools, technical and vocational institutions. Bearing in mind that most of these institutions provide boarding facilities for their students for long periods of time – spanning over several months; the teaching and learning experience is denied access to mobile phones over this long period. This study administered a survey to determine whether this denial has any impact on educational outcomes and what the impact would be if done otherwise. Using variations of selective and random sampling methods on a sample size of 150 respondents from the Nkoranza municipality, results from the study showed that the use of mobile phones in the Ghana educational system will have a positive impact on the teaching and learning process. Teachers and students would have easy access to up-to-date educational materials. However, the study recommends that for this to be effective and sustainable, proper usage supervision must be provided especially for students in order to avoid negative influence that stem from some social media. © 2020, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Source: UG
Mobile phone use for social inclusion: the case of internally displaced people in Nigeria

Internally Displaced People (IDP) have received less attention in ICT4D research. This study examines how IDP in Africa use mobile phones to enhance their social inclusion. We employed Sen’s Capability Approach as the theoretical lens and a qualitative case study as a methodology. Qualitative data obtained from 21 conflict-induced IDP in Nigeria suggests that mobile phones serve not only as a self-help commodity to overcome disconnection from their communities but also a means to enhance their individual and collective capabilities, which in turn fosters their social inclusion. However, generating these capabilities depend on the personal, social, and environmental experiences of IDP. With these findings, the study offers contributions to theory, research, and practice.

Source: UG
Mobile Phone-Assisted Agricultural Extension Services: User Competency And Usage Frequency In Eastern Ghana

Adoption studies have mainly focused on econometric and quantitative modeling that usually assume smallholder farmers competently adopt agricultural technologies. This study provides novel insights on user competency and frequency of usage of mobile telephony for agricultural extension services among smallholder farmers and agricultural extension agents (AEAs) and key factors that impede the adoption process. The study examined users’ competencies and mobile phone usage frequency for access and delivery of agricultural extension services in Eastern Ghana. A multi-stage sampling procedure was used to select 95 AEAs and 330 smallholder farmers in five districts of the Eastern region of Ghana and data were collected through semi-structured interviews. Descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation, and regression analyses were performed to analyze the data. Results showed substantial differences between AEAs and smallholder farmers’ competency in the use of mobile phones for agricultural extension services. Socio-demographic characteristics of smallholder farmers and AEAs correlated with the usage frequency of mobile phones for access to extension services and delivery. Educational level, amount of weekly expenditure of money on mobile phone use, mobile phone network quality, income level, and age of both AEAs and smallholder farmers had positive and significant correlations with the frequency of usage of mobile phones. User competency differentially impacts the frequency of mobile phone use in agricultural extension services between AEAs and smallholders. High call tariffs and access to recharge cards are major challenges in using mobile phones for agricultural extension in the study areas. The study shows components of the adoption theory of compatibility, and complexity where an innovation fits within the socio-cultural framework and perceived difficulty of use. Thus, the frequent use of voice calls is indicative of the early stages of the diffusion process and may diversify into other applications in the future. Farmer-based organizations should be resourced to support the training of farmers to use mobile phones to improve access to agricultural information dissemination. Integrating voice-based agricultural information services (IVRs) into the current SMS-based agricultural extension services in Ghana could potentially boost extension service delivery to smallholder farmers in the Eastern region and across the country. The Ministry of Food and Agriculture may partner with key stakeholders and mobile service providers to offer hands-on capacity building to smallholder farmers and AEAs in video calling/conferencing, multimedia service, and social media to enhance their competencies for improved agricultural extension services.

Source: UG
Mobile phone-based mHealth approaches for public health surveillance in sub-Saharan Africa: a systematic review

Whereas mobile phone-based surveillance has the potential to provide real-time validated data for disease clustering and prompt respond and investigation, little evidence is available on current practice in sub-Sahara Africa. The objective of this review was to examine mobile phone-based mHealth interventions for Public Health surveillance in the region. We conducted electronic search in MEDLINE, EMBASE, IEE Xplore, African Index Medicus (AIM), BioMed Central, PubMed Central (PMC), the Public Library of Science (PLoS) and IRIS for publications used in the review. In all, a total of nine studies were included which focused on infectious disease surveillance of malaria (n = 3), tuberculosis (n = 1) and influenza-like illnesses (n = 1) as well as on non-infectious disease surveillance of child malnutrition (n = 2), maternal health (n = 1) and routine surveillance of various diseases and symptoms (n = 1). Our review revealed that mobile phone-based surveillance projects in the sub-Saharan African countries are on small scale, fragmented and not well documented. We conclude by advocating for a strong drive for more research in the applied field as well as a better reporting of lessons learned in order to create an epistemic community to help build a more evidence-based field of practice in mHealth surveillance in the region.

Source: UG
Mobile Phones and Financial Services in Developing Countries: A Review of Concepts, Methods, Issues, Evidence and Future Research Directions

Research concerning mobile phones and financial services in developing countries has undergone rapid growth in recent years. This paper seeks to improve understanding of the current state of knowledge by reviewing the content of 43 research articles. A framework is developed that differentiates research activity according to a lifecycle model that incorporates financial needs, design, adoption and impact. The review finds that research to date has resulted in a high level of practitioner involvement, providing valuable links from the mobile phone industry to the research community but, as a consequence, research has become too narrowly defined. Thus, issues of assessing financial need and the measurement of impact have been comparatively neglected, while application design and adoption studies have received greater attention. This paper suggests a future direction for research and practice within the mainstream of micro-financial services and finance for the poor, correcting this imbalance, and contributing towards the mobiles-in-development-research agenda.

Source: UG
Mobile Phones and Micro-Trading Activities – Conceptualizing The Link, Info

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of mobile phones on the micro-trading activities of traders in Ghana. The study aims to develop a conceptual model analyzing the impact of mobile phones on pre-trade, during-trade and post-trade activities. Design/methodology/approach – A mixed methods approach consisting of a descriptive survey of 136 traders and a case study of two traders was adopted. Findings – The findings suggest that traders primarily use mobile phones to monitor goods and pricing strategies, scheduling deliveries, and addressing inquiries and complaints in during-trade activities. Traders, including those with no formal education, also use mobile phones as calculators in post-trade activities. This innovative use of mobile phones is a function of their pre-knowledge which may have been developed through formal education and/or social networks. Improving information management through mobile phones directly or indirectly contributes to the economic empowerment of the trader. Research limitations/implications – The paper proposes a conceptual framework that extends the transaction cost theory to consider transaction benefits and effects in micro-trading. The study develops four propositions which can guide future research. Practical implications – The study provides practitioners with a “theoretically-inspired” framework which goes beyond examining design and adoption to identify needs and assess impact in mobiles for development initiatives. Originality/value – The conceptual framework extends the work on transaction cost theory in information systems and may inform future research in mobile phones and micro-trading activities.

Source: UG
Mobile phones andcore network growth in Kenya: Strengthening weak ties

In contrast to recent US studies showing a decrease in core network size, our Kenyan data reveals substantial network growth. We attribute this to the diffusion of mobile telephones. Results from pooled survey data from Nairobi professionals and entrepreneurs in 2002 and 2007 as well as qualitative interviews from 2007 to 2009 show virtual saturation in the diffusion of phones during this period, but no direct effect of technology use. What explains this puzzle is a network effect of mobile telephony: increased technological access to existing networks in a context of resource scarcity leads to a strengthening of weak ties and the enhancement of core networks among Kenyans. Video ethnographic data before and after the 2007 post-election unrest supports this interpretation, showing that mobile phones are a crucial resource in managing interpersonal networks for instrumental purposes. © 2010 Elsevier Inc.

Source: UG
Mobile Phones in Health Care in Uganda The AppLab Study

This study explores the preliminary lessons in the use of mobile phones to promote access to health care information in Uganda. The project under study is the AppLab Uganda Project which operates a Health Tips application, educating users on sexual and reproductive health. Data was collected through in-depth interviews with project developers, partners, medical practitioners and IT journalists and a survey of 149 people randomly selected from two tertiary educational institutions in Uganda. Findings tend to suggest that the need to access health information via mobile text messages is mediated by cost incentives, misconceptions of brand name ‘Google SMS’, and content relevance. There are questions concerning the appropriateness of text messaging as compared to using voice calls to access health information. These issues have implications on the objectives of the health care project and the individual strategies of project partners. Preliminary conclusions emphasize the need to integrate a referral system to registered health professionals and facilities and the need for education and/or a marketing strategy with an indigenous branding to address the misconception of the brand name ‘Google SMS’. Implications for research, policy, and practice are outlined

Source: UG
Mobile Service Capabilities: evidence from a Ghanaian Mobile Service Provider.

Although there is vast literature about the contemporary mobile services (m-services) phenomenon, there is a lack of focus on the strategic processes through which m-services are developed. The dynamic capability framework which lends itself as an appropriate theoretical means of exploring this research gap also lack empirical testing within the m-service research space. The purpose of this paper is to begin to address these gaps in the literature by drawing how a Ghanaian m-services developer develops capabilities to create m-services. This case study gathered qualitative data through key informant interviews, participant observation and a review of accessible company documents, and e-mail correspondence. Drawing on literature on dynamic capabilities, this study draws three conclusions. First, there are four types of m-service capabilities that can be developed i.e. informational, interactional, transactional, and transformational m-service capabilities. Further, the type of m-service capability determines the type of m-service that can be provided. Second, political change determines the type of m-service capability that an m-service provider develops. Third, the extent to which an m-service impacts on its intended market is dependent on the extent of market readiness for that particular m-service type. This study's contribution lies in the operationalisation of the dynamic capability framework in the m-service context. This paper is the first to adapt the dynamic capability framework within the m-service setting to unearth an understanding of how m-service providers create capabilities to develop m-services.

Source: UG
Mobile Telephony, Financial Inclusion and Inclusive Growth

The paper employs the multipurpose nature of mobile telephony to investigate its welfare implications using a large sample of households in Ghana. We use seemingly unrelated probit and instrumental variable procedure to test for two related issues: First, we investigate whether mobile telephony promotes pro-poor development by helping households to efficiently allocate consumption and navigate out of poverty. Second, we analyze whether access to a broad array of financial services enhances the capacity of households to live worthwhile lives. The results show that mobile penetration and financial inclusion significantly reduce the probability of a household becoming poor and increase per capita household consumption of food and non-food items. Our results show that the welfare benefits of mobile telephony and financial inclusion are not more pronounced in female-headed households. These insights serve as useful guide for government and other stakeholders who are looking for avenues to improve livelihoods. © 2017, © 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Source: UG