Agents for educational games and simulations

This book consists mainly of revised papers that were presented at the Agents for Educational Games and Simulation (AEGS) workshop held on May 2, 2011, as part of the Autonomous Agents and MultiAgent Systems (AAMAS) conference in Taipei, Taiwan. The 12 full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from various submissions. The papers are organized topical sections on middleware applications, dialogues and learning, adaption and convergence, and agent applications

Competence in Health Care - An Industrial Systems Analysis Using Competence Bloc Theory to Compare European and US Health Care

While European health care systems are mostly public and similar the contrast is large to the US health industry based to a large extent in the market. Using competence bloc theory the industrial potential of Swedish and European health care is assessed and compared with US health industry. To get the the analysis properly framed health industry is defined to include health insurance, health care and the supporting biotech, pharmaceutical and medical instrument industries. A gradually aging industrialized world makes wealthy customers demand the sophisticated life quality enhancing medical support new technology offers. The overwhelming influence of substitute customership in Europe, through politicians, social insurance, doctors etc., however, holds back development through suppressing the preferences of the true customer (the patient), discouraging innovative product competition and entrepreneurship. The larger part of cost escalation in US health care can be attributed to quality improvements, and luxury health care has stimulated innovative product development. While Swedish health care so far has been a technological winner, commercial competence to become internationally competitive is lacking. It appears politically difficult to recognize that private for profit health care may be both more efficient and profitable than publicly run services. However, once competition for profit has been introduced public providers have to improve performance and the differences will disappear.Health care; Biotechnology; Competence blocs; Experimentally Organized Economy; Entrepreneurship; Industrial Systems analysis; Science Based Industry; Substitute Customers; University Entrepreneurship

Taiwan's COVID-19 response : the interdependence of state and private sector institutions

During 2020, Taiwan's facemask policy formed a critical part of its relatively successful response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It also served to showcase capacities for coordinated action by state and business actors. This article demonstrates that Taiwan's ability to rapidly increase facemask production called for the government and key industry players to overcome a series of cooperation challenges. The authors show that the effective industry response required concerted action in three domains: the state sector, business–government cooperation, and cooperation among private firms. This article makes two contributions. First, it differentiates the dynamics attached to coordination, commitment and collective action challenges that actors in public and private sectors needed to overcome in order to deliver on the policy. Second, it contributes to the literature by endorsing the view that business–government cooperation and private sector coordination are complementary and interdependent. The findings presented here further illustrate the evolution of Taiwan's state institutions in their capacity to take on new tasks and modes of interaction with private sector actors.Peer reviewe

SOCIAL CAPITAL AND HOUSEHOLD INCOME DISTRIBUTIONS: EVIDENCE FROM MICHIGAN AND ILLINOIS

Social capital is a resource increasingly recognized as having important economic and social consequences. Robison and Siles (1999) examined some of these consequences at the U.S. state level and this study extends their efforts. Their 1999 study found important connections between the distributions of social capital and the distributions of household incomes. This study asks if the relationships between social capital and household incomes discovered at the state level are also present at the community level.Consumer/Household Economics, Institutional and Behavioral Economics,

THE PERSONALIZATION-PRIVACY PARADOX EXPLORED THROUGH A PRIVACY CALCULUS MODEL AND HOFSTEDE’S MODEL OF CULTURAL DIMENSIONS

The Personalization-Privacy Paradox is a relevant issue for companies today, as it deals with the paradox of customers who on the one hand want to keep their personal data private, but on the other hand desire the personalization benefits that can be gained by giving up that privacy. Many studies in the past have observed the Personalization-Privacy Paradox, but not thoroughly through the lens of a privacy calculus model. This paper uses a privacy calculus model to examine the Personalization-Privacy Paradox using Hofstede’s Six Dimensions of Culture and examines the United States, Germany, and China as case studies of three different cultures. These three cultures all have a great deal of influence in the world and are world opinion leaders but have vast differences in cultural values and beliefs. This paper shows the importance for marketers, designers, and implementers of personalization services to understand diverse cultures and how their varied idioms, beliefs, and values affect how they will perceive benefits and costs of personalization services in their internal privacy calculus. The marked differences in cultural scores and how those cultural beliefs affect the perceptions of personalization and privacy demonstrate that companies looking to expand their services and applications into new markets cannot rely on universal approaches

Campaigning as a Spitzenkandidat: are lead candidates aligned with their party's manifesto?

Nowadays, political actors use Twitter as one of the main online tools to campaign and connect to their constituencies, and so do "Spitzenkandidaten". The "Spitzenkandidat" process, which was initially implemented in 2014, is a widely researched topic. However, with campaign personalization, being one of its main drivers, it is surprising to see the lack of literature on the subject specifically connected to the lead candidates in the Twitter sphere. This study is filling the gap in the academic literature by answering the question: "To what extent the 2019 Spitzenkandidaten represented their party's manifestos via their tweets or develop individualized campaigns?". The results reveal that the 2019 "Spitzenkandidaten" do not focus on personalization as a main tool in their Twitter behavior. Furthermore, the study shows how factors like the age of the candidate, their party orientation and whether candidates tweet or retweet more, is influencing the outcome.Atualmente, o Twitter é uma das ferramentas online de eleição entre os atores políticos para fazerem campanha e estabelecerem uma ligação com os seus eleitorados, e o mesmo acontece com os "Spitzenkandidaten". O processo de "Spitzenkandidat", inicialmente implementado em 2014, tem sido um tema amplamente investigado. No entanto, com a personalização das campanhas a representar um dos principais fatores impulsionadores, é surpreendente ver a escassez de literatura sobre o assunto e, em particular, literatura relacionada com os principais candidatos na esfera do Twitter. Este estudo vem colmatar a lacuna na literatura académica ao responder à pergunta: "Até que ponto os Spitzenkandidaten de 2019 representaram os programas do seu partido através dos seus tweets ou desenvolveram campanhas individualizadas?". Os resultados revelam que os "Spitzenkandidaten" de 2019 não se centram na personalização como ferramenta principal no seu comportamento no Twitter. Além disso, o estudo demonstra de que forma fatores como a idade do candidato, a sua orientação partidária e se os candidatos fazem mais tweets ou retweets, têm influência no resultado

Working Paper 82 - Public Sector Management in Africa

Even though the public sector in African countries was expected to spearhead socioeconomicdevelopment to reduce poverty, it has proved largely ineffective in performingthis task. Some of the reasons for this ineffectiveness are excessive politicization, lack ofaccountability and representation, inability to promote the public interest andauthoritarian tendencies. The ineffectiveness has led to the call for a redefinition of therole of the public sector. As a contribution to the debate over the proper role of the publicsector and how it has coped with the New Public Management reforms, this paperassesses the state of public sector management in Africa by focusing specifically on thestrengths and challenges facing the state and its bureaucracy in relation to socioeconomicdevelopment and how the challenges can be addressed.Some of the issues the paper examines include:• the existing and/or evolving theoretical paradigms and their relevance to thepublic sector management;• the inability of the African state to promote development in comparison to theAsian “developmental” state;• various public sector reforms (civil service, decentralization, privatization,deregulation, co-production, public-private partnerships, judicial, tax) initiated toimprove state capacity and their outcomes;• the effectiveness of strategies implemented to promote accountability andminimize corruption; and• the issues and problems in aid management and coordination in Africa.In addition to these issues, the paper also highlights possible policy options for the futureand their relevance in addressing the challenges facing public sector management.

Perceptions and preferences of students from small rural high schools in pursuing bachelor's degrees

Scope and Method of Study: The purpose of this descriptive case study was to describe the perceptions and preferences of students from small rural high schools in pursuing bachelor's degrees in a university setting. The lack of congruency between the students' preferred university environment and their perception of their university environment was posited as a reason for students not persisting and earning bachelor's degrees. Eight participants were part of the study. The participants graduated from high schools of less than 400 students which were located within 60 miles of the university they attended. Each participant responded to two assessments: the Social Game Assessment Tool and the Grid and Group Assessment Tool, and each participant participated in an interview. Data was triangulated through the assessments, interviews, field notes, university brochures, catalogs, and websites.Findings and Conclusions: The participants' preferences for a university environment and their perceptions of their university environment were not congruent for four of the six students who earned bachelor's degrees, the criterion for success for this study. The study specifically showed a lack of congruency in the student's preferences and perception of student/instructor relationships and faculty support during their freshman year. Since six of the eight participants earned bachelor's degrees, the importance of congruency of perceptions and preferences for student success is not supported in this study

The Relationship Between Academic Advising and Students\u27 Completion of Corequisite Gateway Courses

This bivariate correlational quantitative study sought to determine how variables predicted students’ course outcomes in first-year English and mathematics courses within a corequisite learning support model. Course outcomes were defined dichotomously on a successful completion or unsuccessful completion basis. The participants of this study included those who initially attempted first-year English (n = 2,055) and mathematics (n = 2,843) course(s) in a corequisite learning support model for the first time between Fall 2018 and Spring 2022 and were assigned as advisees to the professional academic advisors in the centralized advising model. The examined predictors were students’ frequency of sessions, length of time per session, and the first instance in which engagements occurred within the semester between students and professional academic advisors. The researcher deployed a series of binary logistic regressions. The frequency of meetings and the first instance when a student and academic advisor engaged in the semester were significant in students passing first-year corequisite English and mathematics gateway courses

The political economy of fiscal policy and economic management in oil exporting countries

Despite massive oil rent incomes since the early 1970s, the economic performance of oil-exporting countries-with notable exceptions-is poor. While there is extensive literature on the management of oil resources, analysis of the underlying political determinants of this poor performance is more sparse. Drawing on concepts from the comparative institutionalist tradition in political science, the authors develop a generalized typology of political states that is used in analyzing the political economy of fiscal and economic management in oil-exporting countries with widely differing political systems. In assessing performance, the authors focus on issues of long-term savings, economic stabilization, and efficient use of oil rents. The comparisons of country experiences suggest that countries with strong, mature, democratic traditions have advantages in managing oil rents well because of their ability to reach consensus, their educated and informed electorates, and a high level of transparency that facilitates clear decisions on how to use rents over a long horizon. Yet even these systems, ensuring cautious use of oil income is a continuing struggle. Traditional and modernizing autocracies have also demonstrated their ability to sustain long decision horizons and implement developmental policies. But resistance to transparency and the danger of oil-led spending and expenditure commitments becoming the major legitimizing force behind the state may pose risk to the long-term sustainability of their current development strategies. In contrast, little positive effect can be expected from the politically unstable, predatory autocracies, which typically have very short policy horizons and sometimes the characteristics of"roving bandit"regimes. Factional democracies, with weak political parties and highly personalized politics, present particular challenges because they lack a sufficiently effective political system to create a consensus among strong competing interests. Special attention will be needed to increase transparency and raise public awareness in these countries. And oil rent makes it more difficult to sustain a constituency in favor of sound, longer-run economic management because it weakens incentives for agents to support checks and balances that impinge on their individual plans to appropriate the rents. The country comparisons further demonstrate that technical solutions-such as the establishment of oil stabilization funds and budgetary reforms-to enhance transparency and efficiency in the use of oil rents will not work well unless constituencies can be developed in support of such measures.Economic Theory&Research,Public Sector Economics&Finance,Payment Systems&Infrastructure,Environmental Economics&Policies,Decentralization,Environmental Economics&Policies,National Governance,Economic Theory&Research,Public Sector Economics&Finance,Energy and Environment