Responsible Research and Innovation Revisited: Aligning Product Development Processes with the Corporate Responsibility Agenda

It is well established that society faces some grand challenges ahead that have led to a call for more focus on sustainability and socially responsible business practices (European Commission 2010, 2012; Scherer and Palazzo 2011). It is now widely accepted that human-induced climate change is caused by production and consumption patterns that have emerged to meet society’s evolving needs (Unruh 2000; Foxon and Pearson 2006). There are increasing amounts of legislation to try to encourage more sustainable practices and to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. For example, the 2008 United Kingdom (UK) Climate Change Act (UK Parliament 2008) states that “It is the duty of the Secretary of State to ensure that the net UK carbon account for the year 2050 is at least 80 % lower than the 1990 baseline” (p. 1). Other legislation is encouraging manufacturers to take back and recycle their products at the end of their useful lives

Introduction to the Banks of Social Capital, the creation of a new institution or how to release the power of mass collaboration

As the focus on social capital and information technology intensifies in today’s connected world, a deeper understanding of how to harness these two trends is increasingly important. This paper describes how the creation of a new kind of institution could potentially endorse the difficult role of enhancing collaboration between economic agents. Firstly, we will widely describe what a Bank of Social Capital, or BoSC, should look like and the way it operates. Special attention will be further dedicated to its main tool and responsibility: The Virtuous Bond. That is through the fair attribution of this score that the BoSC could exploit that elusive form of capital which is Social Capital. The last part details more pragmatically how exactly this institution would operate and the variables that project holders must fulfil to access the funds. Through this perspective, our study is based on a wide spectrum of fields of research from a collection of interdisciplinary assumptions from Economic behaviour to Technologic and Informatics. It consists mostly of a synthesis work and will try to answer the fundamental question: How can we release the potential of mass collaboration?Visto que hoje em dia o mundo está cada vez mais interligado através de um foco especial no capital social e na informação tecnológica, é extremamente importante obter um conhecimento mais profundo sobre como explorar e utilizar estas duas tendências. Esta dissertação descreve como é que a criação de um novo modelo de instituição poderá apoiar e suportar o processo complicado de aprimorar a colaboração entre agentes económicos. Primeiro, será descrito como é que um Banco de Capital Social (BosC) deve funcionar. Posteriormente, será dada uma atenção especial à sua principal ferramenta e responsabilidade: a “Virtuous Bond”. Esta instituição, BosC, poderá explorar este tipo de capital social através da atribuição e distribuição justa deste tipo de ferramenta, a “Virtuous Bond”. A última parte desta dissertação descreve de uma maneira mais pragmática como é que esta instituição deverá operar e quais as variáveis e requerimentos que os detentores de projetos deveram preencher de modo a ter acesso aos fundos desta instituição. Nesta perspetiva, este estudo baseia-se num vasto espectro de campos de pesquisa através da análise de suposições interdisciplinares desde Comportamento Económico até Tecnologia e Informática. Consiste maioritariamente num trabalho sintetizado que visa responder a uma pergunta fundamental: Como é que podemos potenciar a colaboração em massa

Assisting in the Development of an Aquaponic Greenhouse Enterprise

The goal of this project was to aid The Worcester Roots Project by advancing the progress of their pilot aquaponic greenhouse, and assist Greenvitalize by exploring options to expand their startup enterprise. To accomplish this goal, our team designed the biological system and assessed the structural integrity of the greenhouse. We also developed a strategic plan for Greenvitalize\u27s enterprise and conducted market analysis of viable species to grown in the greenhouse. This project resulted in a forum that allows Greenvitalize to act as a source of urban farming knowledge and collaboration, and a guide to assist individuals interested in aquaponics to create an enterprise similar to Greenvitalize

Social support, social capital and online community e-loyalty: an empirical study

Online communities, as an essential manifestation of online social relationships, sociality factors (including social support factors and social relationship factors, etc.) ought to facilitate the formation of community trust and community satisfaction. However, although the existing literature has explored the underlying mechanisms of online community trust and satisfaction formation, few studies implemented research from the integrated sociality perspectives. In this thesis, we integrate social capital theory and social support theory to consider social capital and social support as important antecedent social factors in forming community trust and community satisfaction, which influence users' trust and satisfaction in online communities. Community trust and satisfaction further promote community loyalty. Specifically, this thesis scrutinizes the influence of three levels of social support factors such as information support, emotional support, and human-computer network management support and three kinds of social capital such as structure, cognition, and relationship to online community trust and satisfaction. Based on the proposed research model, 430 online community users' survey data were collected through an empirical questionnaire and the research model was tested through the partial least squares structural equation model method. The results of the thesis suggest that social support factors, including information support, emotional support, and interpersonal network interaction support, and social capital factors including structural capital, relational capital, and cognitive capital significantly affect community users' loyalty not only directly but also indirectly through enhancing community users' trust and satisfaction. Thus, users' trust and satisfaction with the community are significant mediating variables.Nas comunidades online, como uma importante manifestação das relações sociais online, os fatores de socialidade (incluindo fatores de apoio social e fatores de relacionamento social) devem facilitar a formação de confiança e satisfação da comunidade. No entanto, embora a literatura existente tenha explorado os mecanismos subjacentes à formação da confiança e da satisfação da comunidade online, poucos estudos consideraram a perspectiva social de forma integrada. Nesta tese, integramos a teoria do capital social e a teoria do suporte social para considerar o capital social e o suporte social como importantes fatores sociais antecedentes na formação da confiança e satisfação da comunidade, que influenciam a confiança e a satisfação dos utilizadores em comunidades online. A confiança e a satisfação da comunidade promovem ainda mais a lealdade da comunidade. Especificamente, esta tese estuda a influência de três níveis de fatores de suporte social - suporte de informação, suporte emocional e suporte de gestão da relação homen-computador - e três tipos de capital social - estrutura, cognição e relacionamento - na confiança e satisfação da comunidade online. Com base no modelo de pesquisa proposto, 430 observações de utilizadores de comunidades online foram recolhidos através de um questionário. O modelo de pesquisa foi testado através de métodos de equação estruturais. Os resultados da tese relevam que fatores de suporte social, incluindo suporte de informação, suporte emocional e suporte de interação de rede interpessoal, e fatores de capital social, incluindo capital estrutural, capital relacional e capital cognitivo, afetam significativamente a lealdade dos utilizadores da comunidade, não apenas diretamente mas também indiretamente, aumentando a confiança e a satisfação dos utilizadores da comunidade; a confiança e a satisfação dos usuários com a comunidade são variáveis mediadoras importantes

Accelerating social science knowledge production with the coordinated open-source model

With the growing complexity of knowledge production, social science must accelerate and open up to maintain explanatory power and responsiveness. This requires redesigning the front-end of research to build an open and expandable knowledge infrastructure that stimulates broad collaborations, enables breaking down inertia and path dependencies of conventional approaches, and boosts discovery and innovation. This article discusses the coordinated open-source model as a promising organisational scheme that can supplement conventional research infrastructure in certain areas. The model offers flexibility, decentralization, and community-based development and aligns with open science ideas, such as reproducibility and transparency. Similar solutions have been successfully applied in natural science, but social science lags behind. I present the model's design, and consider its potential and limitations (e.g., regarding development, sustainability and coordination). I also discuss open-source applications in various areas, including the first open-source survey harmonization project in social science

Players' Motivations to Participate the Mobile Game Design with the Game Creator

The thesis investigates the players' motivations to participate in the innovation process of mobile game design. The topics of the thesis are mobile game, online community, and user-centered innovation. Although many researchers have studied the fields, there is not enough research looking into the practice of user-centered innovation and the role of online community in the mobile game industry. Meanwhile, mobile game creators seek for players' feedback and ideas to improve games and, further, players' loyalty. Thus, the thesis attempts to present a new model to demonstrate the motivations. The model provides the insights to explore the factors of a successful innovation community. It also displays the determinants of an attractive environment for users to share ideas. The thesis uses content analysis. The data is from "Ideas & Feature Requests" of Clash Royale online community, a mobile game produced by Supercell. The thesis concentrates on card idea threads. Total 2198 threads are analyzed. A research model is built based on the previous research. "Enjoyment", "Feedback", and "Leadership" (with "Lead Member" and "Moderator") are the motivations in the research model. The analysis results affirm the motivations and give more insights. The results find that "praise" and "advice" are the essential types of feedbacks. And feedbacks could increase enjoyment. The final model consists of "Enjoyment", "Feedback" (with "Praise" and "Advice"), and "Leadership" (with "Lead Member" and "Moderator"). It indicates the influence of feedback on enjoyment as well. In conclusion, enjoyment encourages players to participate innovation; feedback and leadership draw them to share the ideas

Critically engaging engineering in place by localizing counternarratives in engineering design

In this manuscript, we use the construct of critical epistemologies of place to frame our exploration of how to support engineering design among youth who have historically been marginalized from the domain, and its implications for educational settings. We present an in-depth longitudinal case study of one 12-year-old African American boy to raise questions of what it means for this youth to engage in engineering design in collaboration with the people around in him—experts and knowledgeable others in his community space and how this engagement supports his work in science and engineering. This study suggests that engaging engineering design through a critical epistemology of place involves an iterative and generative process of layering community wisdom and knowledge onto STEM toward (a) how epistemologies of place—and their layers—challenge dominant master narratives, (b) reimagining practices in place, and (c) transforming the dangerous territory of STEM. Our study expands upon current understandings of supporting youth in engaging engineering through highlighting the vital role of sociohistorically constructed understandings of STEM and community in determining when, how, and why engineering takes place

ECSCW 2013 Adjunct Proceedings The 13th European Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work 21 - 25. September 2013, Paphos, Cyprus

This volume presents the adjunct proceedings of ECSCW 2013.While the proceedings published by Springer Verlag contains the core of the technical program, namely the full papers, the adjunct proceedings includes contributions on work in progress, workshops and master classes, demos and videos, the doctoral colloquium, and keynotes, thus indicating what our field may become in the future