6,126 research outputs found

    UMSL Bulletin 2023-2024

    Get PDF
    The 2023-2024 Bulletin and Course Catalog for the University of Missouri St. Louis.https://irl.umsl.edu/bulletin/1088/thumbnail.jp

    Financial openness, financial fragility and policies for economic stability: a comparative analysis across regions of the developing world

    Get PDF
    This book presents a comparative analysis of the policy responses of developing countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean to the challenges that greater external financial openness and price and exchange-rate flexibility pose to economic stability. Greater external openness has significantly narrowed developing economies’ policy space, while at the same time increasing the potential for financial fragility and instability. These challenges, which have come to the fore since the global financial crisis of 2008–2009, are also manifest in the profound impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and will shape the post-pandemic recovery. The book examines how different countries have used capital controls and macroprudential tools and highlights key lessons learned.Presentation .-- Introduction .-- Chapter I. Capital flow regulation: selected experiences in developing countries from Latin America, Africa and Asia-Pacific and analysis of the type of capital controls needed to confront the disruptive effects of the COVID-19 / Esteban Pérez Caldentey, Zebulun Kreiter, Martín Abeles .-- Chapter II. Challenges posed by the Global Development trajectory from 2022 to 2030 / Terry McKinley .-- Chapter III. A critical assessment of macroprudential regulation and comparative regional experiences focusing on Latin America and the Caribbean / Esteban Pérez Caldentey, Lorenzo Nalin, Leonardo Rojas .-- Chapter V. Macroprudential policies in Asia: A consideration of some Asian experiences / Jayati Ghosh .-- Chapter VI. Macroprudential policies in Latin America / Pablo Gabriel Bortz .-- Chapter VII. A Framework to Interpret Macroprudential Policies in an Era of Financialization / Matías Vernengo .-- Chapter VIII. A baseline stock-flow model for the analysis of macroprudential regulation guidelines and policies for Latin America and the Caribbean / Esteban Perez Caldentey, Lorenzo Nalin, Leonardo Rojas .-- Chapter IX. Finance-led premature de-industrialization and the role of external macroprudential policy for post-COVID-19 transformative development: Latin America in a comparative perspective / Alberto Botta, Giuliano Yajima, Gabriel Porcile .-- Chapter X. Conclusions / Esteban Pérez Caldentey, Juan Carlos Moreno-Brid, Lorenzo Nalín

    Empowering Information Systems Users: The Role of Timely and Customizable Information for User Engagement and Selection Behavior

    Get PDF
    Information systems (IS) increasingly empower their users by strengthening users’ capability and autonomy to make their own decisions how to use and engage with IS. Specifically, users are empowered when they have sufficient knowledge to make rational decisions within IS and sufficient control to shape their experience with IS. In line with these pillars of empowerment, technological advancements unlock new possibilities for IS providers to empower users with access to high quality information (e.g., by providing timely updates of dynamically changing information) and with the ability to control the information stream (e.g., by implementing interfaces to customize websites). As a result, users have greater autonomy to actively shape their user experience to their likening, making them less dependent on having to identify IS that match their needs. At the same time, empowering users pays off for IS providers, as empowered users are known to form more positive attitudes and intentions to engage with the empowering IS. This thesis addresses the two aforementioned pillars of empowerment through knowledge and empowerment through control. Four studies shed light on how the increasingly prevalent practice of empowering users with timely and customizable information affects user engagement as well as users’ selection behavior. The first strand of this thesis investigates user empowerment through timely information in the context of decision support systems (DSS) that aid users in their selection of which (physical) location to visit. To avoid congestion at locations, such DSS communicate how busy each location is by displaying crowding information (CI), accompanied by timeliness cues indicating when this CI was retrieved (e.g., “updated just now” vs. “average over the last year”). Helping users avoid crowded locations becomes all the more important during periods of extraordinary pathogenic risk, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, where physical distancing is imperative for the containment of the pathogen. Against this background, the first study in this thesis investigates how CI with different levels of timeliness affects how users select between differently crowded medical practices. The results demonstrate that while the display of CI is generally useful for users to avoid crowded locations, providing particularly timely CI (i.e., updated close to real-time) leads users to select less crowded locations even more effectively. Moreover, this effect is strongest for individuals who exhibit low levels of health anxiety – an important contextual variable influencing user behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic. The second study extends the findings of the first study by investigating a context in which hedonic motives may encourage users to seek instead of avoid crowds. Specifically, the study examines how timely CI affects users’ choice between differently crowded bars. Despite users longing for the presence of others as part of their visit experience, the results show that particularly timely CI makes users more aware of potential costs of congestion (e.g., prolonged wait times) and consequently leads users to select less crowded locations – thereby corroborating the previous findings in the utilitarian context of selecting a medical practice. Importantly, timelier CI also increases user engagement in that users express a greater intention to reuse the DSS providing the CI. This finding indicates that timely CI not only contributes to the containment of congestion, but also allows DSS providers to retain users more effectively and thereby achieve recurring impact on the reduction of crowding. The second strand of this thesis investigates user empowerment through customizable information in the context of (banner) ads on websites. As ads oftentimes cause irritation and stifle user engagement with the website, first website providers have begun to empower users to customize how many ads they agree to have displayed. Despite website providers hoping to thereby enhance user engagement, it is unclear how users respond to the ability to customize ads they never asked for. Against this backdrop, the third study investigates how the provision of ad quantity customization (AQC) affects user engagement and which ad quantity levels users opt for. The results demonstrate that offering AQC consistently enhances user engagement in that users with access to AQC stay longer on the website and visit more sub-pages than users who cannot customize ad quantity. Counter-intuitively, a website with ads that offers AQC elicits even greater user engagement than a website that is entirely free of ads by default. In addition, the effect on user engagement is strongest for users accessing the website with a mobile (vs. stationary) device. Interestingly, users do not configure AQC to eliminate ads altogether, but instead opt for 29.0% of the default amount of ads to be displayed. The fourth study seeks to extend the previous findings by shedding light on the underlying mechanism that drives the effect of providing AQC on user engagement. The findings suggest that offering AQC elicits perceived empowerment as a pivotal stimulant with two important outcomes: First, users pay closer attention to the website, thereby discovering more information useful to them and consequently experiencing a greater fit between the website’s information and their own needs. Second, the feeling of being in control over ads, as typically immutable and irritating website elements, elicits a sense of enjoyment. Both informational fit and perceived enjoyment then lead users to engage more intensely with the website. Overall, this thesis showcases the role and importance of IS-enabled user empowerment by providing a more comprehensive understanding of how empowering users with timely and customizable information affects user engagement and users’ selection behavior. In doing so, this thesis answers calls for research that urge scholars to not only shed light on emerging phenomena, but also to enable and empower IS users. The studies in this thesis contribute to IS research on empowerment by (1) revealing the importance of timeliness of information as a thus far under-investigated source of empowerment and by (2) uncovering ad customization as a hitherto largely neglected, yet important piece of web customization that complements our understanding of empowerment mechanisms. In addition, this thesis also offers valuable insights and actionable recommendations how DSS providers and policy makers can harness empowerment through timely CI to recurringly reduce crowding without infringing on users’ freedom. Likewise, this thesis guides website providers how to leverage ads as website elements that users enjoy to customize to boost user engagement with the website as a whole

    Making friends with failure in STS

    Get PDF

    The nexus between e-marketing, e-service quality, e-satisfaction and e-loyalty: a cross-sectional study within the context of online SMEs in Ghana

    Get PDF
    The spread of the Internet, the proliferation of mobile devices, and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic have given impetus to online shopping in Ghana and the subregion. This situation has also created opportunities for SMEs to take advantage of online marketing technologies. However, there is a dearth of studies on the link between e-marketing and e-loyalty in terms of online shopping, thereby creating a policy gap on the prospects for business success for online SMEs in Ghana. Therefore, the purpose of the study was to examine the relationship between the main independent variable, e-marketing and the main dependent variable, e-loyalty, as well as the mediating roles of e-service quality and e-satisfaction in the link between e-marketing and e-loyalty. The study adopted a positivist stance with a quantitative method. The study was cross-sectional in nature with the adoption of a descriptive correlational design. A Structural Equation Modelling approach was employed to examine the nature of the associations between the independent, mediating and dependent variables. A sensitivity analysis was also conducted to control for the potential confounding effects of the demographic factors. A sample size of 1,293 residents in Accra, Ghana, who had previously shopped online, responded to structured questionnaire in an online survey via Google Docs. The IBM SPSS Amos 24 software was used to analyse the data collected. Positive associations were found between the key constructs in the study: e-marketing, e-service quality, e-satisfaction and e-Loyalty. The findings from the study gave further backing to the diffusion innovation theory, resource-based view theory, and technology acceptance model. In addition, e-service quality and e-satisfaction individually and jointly mediated the relationship between e-marketing and e-loyalty. However, these mediations were partial, instead of an originally anticipated full mediation. In terms of value and contribution, this is the first study in a developing economy context to undertake a holistic examination of the key marketing performance variables within an online shopping context. The study uniquely tested the mediation roles of both e-service quality and e-satisfaction in the link between e-marketing and e-loyalty. The findings of the study are novel in the e-marketing literature as they unearthed the key antecedents of e-loyalty for online SMEs in a developing economy context. The study suggested areas for further related studies and also highlighted the limitations

    Surveillance Graphs: Vulgarity and Cloud Orthodoxy in Linked Data Infrastructures

    Get PDF
    Information is power, and that power has been largely enclosed by a handful of information conglomerates. The logic of the surveillance-driven information economy demands systems for handling mass quantities of heterogeneous data, increasingly in the form of knowledge graphs. An archaeology of knowledge graphs and their mutation from the liberatory aspirations of the semantic web gives us an underexplored lens to understand contemporary information systems. I explore how the ideology of cloud systems steers two projects from the NIH and NSF intended to build information infrastructures for the public good to inevitable corporate capture, facilitating the development of a new kind of multilayered public/private surveillance system in the process. I argue that understanding technologies like large language models as interfaces to knowledge graphs is critical to understand their role in a larger project of informational enclosure and concentration of power. I draw from multiple histories of liberatory information technologies to develop Vulgar Linked Data as an alternative to the Cloud Orthodoxy, resisting the colonial urge for universality in favor of vernacular expression in peer to peer systems

    Digital 3D reconstruction as a research environment in art and architecture history: uncertainty classification and visualisation

    Get PDF
    The dissertation addresses the still not solved challenges concerned with the source-based digital 3D reconstruction, visualisation and documentation in the domain of archaeology, art and architecture history. The emerging BIM methodology and the exchange data format IFC are changing the way of collaboration, visualisation and documentation in the planning, construction and facility management process. The introduction and development of the Semantic Web (Web 3.0), spreading the idea of structured, formalised and linked data, offers semantically enriched human- and machine-readable data. In contrast to civil engineering and cultural heritage, academic object-oriented disciplines, like archaeology, art and architecture history, are acting as outside spectators. Since the 1990s, it has been argued that a 3D model is not likely to be considered a scientific reconstruction unless it is grounded on accurate documentation and visualisation. However, these standards are still missing and the validation of the outcomes is not fulfilled. Meanwhile, the digital research data remain ephemeral and continue to fill the growing digital cemeteries. This study focuses, therefore, on the evaluation of the source-based digital 3D reconstructions and, especially, on uncertainty assessment in the case of hypothetical reconstructions of destroyed or never built artefacts according to scientific principles, making the models shareable and reusable by a potentially wide audience. The work initially focuses on terminology and on the definition of a workflow especially related to the classification and visualisation of uncertainty. The workflow is then applied to specific cases of 3D models uploaded to the DFG repository of the AI Mainz. In this way, the available methods of documenting, visualising and communicating uncertainty are analysed. In the end, this process will lead to a validation or a correction of the workflow and the initial assumptions, but also (dealing with different hypotheses) to a better definition of the levels of uncertainty

    Digital opportunities to ensure the transparency of financial rela-tions in entrepreneurship

    Get PDF
    В монографії розглядаються питання цифровізації економіки, яка відкриває перед бізнесом нові можливості та перспективи. Використання цифрових технологій дозволяє суб'єктам бізнесу знизити витрати, підвищити ефективність і конкурентоспроможність підприємства, здійснювати випуск нових видів товарів, займаючи певні ніші над ринком цифрових товарів та послуг. Розглянуто проблеми, пов'язані не тільки з пошуком інвестицій, але і формуванням нових компетенцій суб'єктів бізнесу, що дозволяють успішно орієнтуватися в умовах цифрової трансформації. .В монографии рассматриваются вопросы цифровизации экономики, открывающей перед бизнесом новые возможности и перспективы. Использование цифровых технологий позволяет субъектам бизнеса снизить издержки, повысить эффективность и конкурентоспособность предприятия, осуществлять выпуск новых видов товаров, занимая определенные ниши на рынке цифровых товаров и услуг. Рассмотрены проблемы, связанные не только с поиском инвестиций, но и формированием новых компетенций субъектов бизнеса, позволяющих успешно ориентироваться в условиях цифровой трансформации.The monograph examines issues of digitization of the economy, which opens up new opportunities and prospects for business. The use of digital technologies allows business entities to reduce costs, increase the efficiency and competitiveness of the enterprise, to produce new types of goods, occupying certain niches in the market of digital goods and services. The problems related not only to the search for investments, but also to the formation of new competencies of business subjects, which allow to successfully navigate in the conditions of digital transformation, are considered.The monograph contains the results of research conducted within the scope of scientific research work «Digitalization and transparency of public, corporate and personal finance: the impact on innovation development and national security») (state registration number – 0122U000774)

    Scientific dissemination and professional practices through digital media: The study of pragmatic strategies in the communication of international research projects

    Get PDF
    La investigación científica hoy en día está ligada a los procesos de globalización y a la búsqueda de la innovación y la excelencia, lo cual favorece una creciente colaboración, internacionalización y multidisciplinariedad. Para llevar a cabo estas iniciativas ambiciosas y de gran escala, los investigadores necesitan la financiación externa que distintas organizaciones, instituciones y programas pueden proporcionar. Esta reconfiguración del trabajo académico va de la mano de la ubiquidad y popularidad de Internet. Un extenso abanico de géneros, plataformas y medios digitales permiten a los científicos y académicos difundir sus investigaciones a una audiencia amplia y heterogénea. La inversión de esfuerzo en la comunicación mediada digitalmente permite a los investigadores contribuir a una diseminación más efectiva del conocimiento generado, así como cumplir con su compromiso social. Por otra parte, este esfuerzo les puede permitir reforzar su reputación como investigadores y conseguir un mayor impacto. Un ejemplo destacado de este escenario académico cambiante donde se maximiza el discurso digital para propósitos investigadores es el de los proyectos de investigación internacionales. Se trata de consorcios compuestos de miembros provenientes de entornos socioculturales y profesionales distintos que hacen uso de sitios web y redes sociales para la diseminación de sus proyectos conjuntos y utilizan las características tecnológicas y comunicativas de estos espacios digitales para ofrecer actualizaciones periódicas de su trabajo e información sobre hallazgos en progreso y resultados de investigación. De este modo, rinden cuentas a los organismos que los financian y aumentan su visibilidad entre los lectores digitales. Las intenciones comunicativas de estos equipos de investigación para cumplir dichos objetivos se codifican y transmiten discursivamente a través de diversas estrategias pragmáticas, que se encuadran en determinados parámetros contextuales y que responden a las especificidades del medio y se ven constreñidas por estas. Estas estrategias revelan cómo los investigadores comparten la información, cómo publicitan sus hallazgos y cómo se dirigen a sus potenciales lectores.Así, esta tesis doctoral tiene como objetivo investigar las estrategias pragmáticas prominentes en lengua inglesa empleadas por grupos de investigación internacionales en sus prácticas digitales discursivas, que normalmente se materializan en sitios webs y redes sociales para sus proyectos. Con este propósito, se compiló y analizó el corpus digital EUROPRO, que contiene 30 sitios web de proyectos de investigación que recibieron financiación en el marco del programa Horizonte2020 (subcorpus EUROPROwebs) y las correspondientes cuentas de Twitter de aquellos proyectos (subcorpus EUROPROtweets). Dichos subcorpus han sido extraídos de la base de datos digital EUROPRO recopilada por el grupo de investigación InterGedi. En mi tesis doctoral propongo una taxonomía derivada de los datos como resultado del análisis del corpus, que comprende 27 estrategias organizadas en torno a tres macrocategorías: informativas, promocionales e interaccionales. Incido teórica y metodológicamente en el proceso de diseñar y revisar esta herramienta analítica para así demonstrar su solidez y viabilidad. Además, analizo el rango de ocurrencia, la frecuencia y el uso específico de estas estrategias en las secciones que aparecen de manera sistemática en los sitios web incluidos en el corpus y en las páginas web donde se aloja la mayor parte de la información sobre el proyecto (Homepage, About, Partners, News & Events), en las cuentas de Twitter y, de forma comparativa, entre las secciones web y los tuits, con el fin de observar tendencias significativas y en cuanto a similitudes y diferencias en su funcionamiento en estos medios digitales. Además, adopto un enfoque etnográfico mediante la inclusión de evidencias contextuales conseguidas a través de entrevistas semi-estructuradas con investigadores de los proyectos Horizonte2020, cuyos resultados ayudan a sustentar los hallazgos procedentes del análisis textual. También tomo una perspectiva multimodal sobre cómo se emplean las estrategias pragmáticas en los sitios web de proyectos de investigación en relación a la sección Homepages. Este análisis, en concreto, permite reconocer el potencial de los recursos verbales y visuales para la construcción de significado desde una perspectiva pragmática. En general, el presente estudio busca ahondar en nuestro entendimiento de prácticas académicas digitales que están evolucionando rápidamente y que tienen gran alcance, en particular adoptadas por grupos de investigación, que pueden beneficiarse de los resultados y las implicaciones de esta investigación para la futura comunicación y diseminación de sus proyectos científicos.<br /
    corecore