Decision Support Systems Adoption Among Strategic Decision Makers in Higher Learning Institution in Yemen

It is claimed that higher education institutions in Yemen do not have clear visions, missions, strategic objectives, and they apply traditional management systems with complex procedures. In addition, there has been some ignorance of technology among the Yemeni strategic decision makers because they have not had a clear view of what Information Technology applications can contribute in developing their institutions and the strategic decision-making, and styles of the strategic decision makers. IT applications can also be used in investigating the perceived acceptance of the strategic decision makers towards decision support systems (DSS) technologies. Thus, the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) has been adopted. A total of 121 forms of questionnaire were collected from the strategic decision makers in Sana’a University and Science and Technology University. Descriptive, regression and structural equation modeling analyses were run to test the hypotheses. The present study found that the research policy, adoption of information technology applications, curriculum, mission, organization of colleges and university, admission policies, financial policies, facilities and equipment, and institutional governance personnel are areas that require strategic decisions in the Yemeni higher learning institutions. Regarding decision making styles, the majority are technical-oriented (analytical and directive) strategic decision makers. The findings indicate that performance expectancy and strategic value expectancy have a significant positive influence on behavioural intention of the strategic decision makers to adopt the DSS. However social influence was found to have influence on behavioural intention when it was tested alone as an independent construct. The strategic decision maker’s decision making style moderates the relationship between efforts expectancy and behavioural intention only. However, administrative experience and professional achievement moderate the relationship between performance expectancy and strategic value expectancy, and behavioural intention only. As a conclusion, this study suggests that technology adoption can be a new strategic decision area

The student-produced electronic portfolio in craft education

The authors studied primary school students’ experiences of using an electronic portfolio in their craft education over four years. A stimulated recall interview was applied to collect user experiences and qualitative content analysis to analyse the collected data. The results indicate that the electronic portfolio was experienced as a multipurpose tool to support learning. It makes the learning process visible and in that way helps focus on and improves the quality of learning. © ISLS.Peer reviewe

Evaluating the influence of music on shoppers' flow in an online fashion retail environment

Music is widely considered to be an important atmospheric which influences shoppers' emotions, cognitive evaluations and behavioural outcomes in a traditional in-store retail environment. Nonetheless, there is only limited knowledge on the role of music and its impact in an online retail context. 'Flow' as a measure of shopper enjoyment has been found to have a positive influence on online shoppers' intentional behaviour. To the author's knowledge, there is no comprehensive framework that captures music as a web atmospheric and its impact on shoppers' flow due to a lack of empirical evidence. Therefore, the aim of this study is to evaluate the relationship between music as a web atmospheric and shoppers' state of flow (a measure of enjoyment) in an online fashion retail environment. A conceptual framework was developed based on the Stimulus-Organism-Response framework. Following the between-subject control and intervention approach, a data collection tool that emulates a real-life online shopping experience was designed. A non-probability online questionnaire was conducted using 462 participants. After the preliminary data analysis, structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to test direct, indirect and moderation effects of the hypothesised relationships. The analysis found that music has no direct effect on shoppers' state of flow or arousal. Nonetheless, the multi-group analysis evidenced that music is a moderating variable, strengthening the relationship between shoppers' arousal and flow. Furthermore, the SEM also confirmed that the pathways from shoppers' arousal to flow, arousal to pleasure, flow to pleasure remained the same whether participants were exposed to music or not. This indicates that music did not change the relationship structure of the constructs. This thesis contributes to theory by firstly offering empirical evidence investigating the relationship between music as a web atmospheric and shoppers' state of flow. Secondly, the findings offer a new understanding of the moderating effect of music as a web atmospheric. Thirdly, this study provides a theoretically grounded framework, which captures the relationship between music as a web atmospheric, shoppers' state of flow, arousal and pleasure in an online fashion retail environment. Lastly, this study contributes to the methodology in the field of music as a web atmospheric by replicating an authentic shopping environment in order to capture shoppers' real-time online shopping experience

Enhancing Free-text Interactions in a Communication Skills Learning Environment

Learning environments frequently use gamification to enhance user interactions.Virtual characters with whom players engage in simulated conversations often employ prescripted dialogues; however, free user inputs enable deeper immersion and higher-order cognition. In our learning environment, experts developed a scripted scenario as a sequence of potential actions, and we explore possibilities for enhancing interactions by enabling users to type free inputs that are matched to the pre-scripted statements using Natural Language Processing techniques. In this paper, we introduce a clustering mechanism that provides recommendations for fine-tuning the pre-scripted answers in order to better match user inputs

Exploring the therapeutic relationship in the digital age

The demand for online counselling continues to grow, yet the presence of counselling psychologists who work in this way is limited (Wong, Bonn, Tam & Wong., 2018; Shaw & Shaw, 2006). One of the reasons cited for this is due to factors surrounding the therapeutic relationship (Richards & Viganó, 2012; Hanley & Reynolds, 2009) yet little is known about the experience of this. It is therefore important to explore the therapeutic relationship in online settings, particularly from the perspective of the therapist. This study explores how counselling psychologists experience the therapeutic relationship online when connecting via videoconference technology. Six counselling psychologists described their experience during individual, one-to-one semi-structured interviews, conducted online via webcam. Participant interviews were transcribed and analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. There are three superordinate themes that were established from the data and each theme consists of related sub-themes. Superordinate theme 1: ‘“It reduces it to that little box”: the perception of physical distance in the therapeutic relationship online’. This theme explored participants’ perception of not sharing the same physical and environmental space as their client. Superordinate theme 2: ‘“It’s head to head therapy”: the paradoxical experience of the therapeutic relationship online’. This theme contextualises and explores the meaning making of the inconsistencies in participants’ experience of the therapeutic relationship. Superordinate theme 3: ‘“Working with my hands tied behind my back”: ethical concerns and perceived struggles of engaging in a therapeutic relationship online’. The final theme acknowledges the ethical concerns and experience of struggles identified by the participants and explores the deeper subjective experience of power dynamics and feeling of inhibition in the online environment. All themes are discussed in relation to previous research regarding the online therapeutic relationship and implications for counselling psychology practice are considered. In particular, the need for training professionals to feel more comfortable and confident working with clients online is supported. The areas of improvement, strengths and suggestions for future research are also highlighted