Indications of Personality Trait Difference between ICT and Other Students

The paper reports on a survey undertaken amongst first year students who were taking introductory courses in departments within Schools of IT at two South African universities. The purpose of the survey was to understand factors influencing career choice and how educationalists could use this to encourage enrollment in computer-related degree programmes. This paper considers association of values with chosen careers, other career outcomes that students consider important and their perceptions regarding personal characteristics of ICT students. The responses of students who intend taking computer-related courses up to third year and those who are taking other majors are compared. Gender is also considered. Significant differences were discovered and are associated with a variety of different theories that are broadly related to personal characteristics and personality (Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and the Five Factors Model). An INTJ profile for males and an INFJ profile for female students intending to major in computer-related courses seem to emerge. Low Power Distance, low Uncertainty Avoidance, and high Masculinity are tentatively proposed as cultural dimensions of the ICT career culture

When the words are not everything: the use of laughter, fillers, back-channel, silence, and overlapping speech in phone calls

This article presents an observational study on how some common conversational cues – laughter, fillers, back-channel, silence, and overlapping speech – are used during mobile phone conversations. The observations are performed over the SSPNet Mobile Corpus, a collection of 60 calls between pairs of unacquainted individuals (120 subjects for roughly 12 h of material in total). The results show that the temporal distribution of the social signals above is not uniform, but it rather reflects the social meaning they carry and convey. In particular, the results show significant use differences depending on factors such as gender, role (caller or receiver), topic, mode of interaction (agreement or disagreement), personality traits, and conflict handling style

How Do You Like Me in This: User Embodiment Preferences for Companion Agents

We investigate the relationship between the embodiment of an artificial companion and user perception and interaction with it. In a Wizard of Oz study, 42 users interacted with one of two embodiments: a physical robot or a virtual agent on a screen through a role-play of secretarial tasks in an office, with the companion providing essential assistance. Findings showed that participants in both condition groups when given the choice would prefer to interact with the robot companion, mainly for its greater physical or social presence. Subjects also found the robot less annoying and talked to it more naturally. However, this preference for the robotic embodiment is not reflected in the users’ actual rating of the companion or their interaction with it. We reflect on this contradiction and conclude that in a task-based context a user focuses much more on a companion’s behaviour than its embodiment. This underlines the feasibility of our efforts in creating companions that migrate between embodiments while maintaining a consistent identity from the user’s point of view

A Comparison of the Aptitude and Attitude of College Students Toward Social and Technical Computer Technology

The purpose of this study was to investigate college students\u27 technical and social technology competencies based upon their attitudes toward computers and their perception of technical computer knowledge. The participants for this investigation were college undergraduates majoring in apparel merchandising and design and other related and non-related majors at the University of Arkansas. The research model selected for use in this study was the survey design method. There were a total of 1270 students responding to the survey with 1052 usable surveys remaining after cleaning the data for missing entries. This constituted an 83% response rate. The findings included significant effects of social aptitude by age and major, and technical aptitude by major. Males had significantly higher perceptions of technical aptitude, and both social and technical attitude toward computer technology than females. Whites had significantly higher perceptions of social aptitude toward computer technology than Nonwhites. Class standing had no significant effect on college student\u27s perceptions of either aptitude or attitude in social or technical computer technology. There were strong correlations between social aptitude and technical aptitude and social attitude and technical attitude. Colleges and universities as well as industry are taking advantage of social technology not only for recruitment but in the classroom and on the job as well. A strong relationship between social and technical aptitude and social and technical attitude would tend to indicate that students are ready for this type of interaction

Alter ego, state of the art on user profiling: an overview of the most relevant organisational and behavioural aspects regarding User Profiling.

This report gives an overview of the most relevant organisational and\ud behavioural aspects regarding user profiling. It discusses not only the\ud most important aims of user profiling from both an organisation’s as\ud well as a user’s perspective, it will also discuss organisational motives\ud and barriers for user profiling and the most important conditions for\ud the success of user profiling. Finally recommendations are made and\ud suggestions for further research are given

The Role of Dispositional and Situational Factors in Assessment of User Response to New IT – A Coping Theory Perspective of User Adaptation from IT Implementation to Job Outcomes.

New IT-related disturbing events remain a significant challenge for organizations as individuals could perceive what is at stake for them as an opportunity or a threat. Furthermore, they assess the resources available while engaging in these situations. Therefore, it is essential to study the contextual and dispositional factors which affect specific adaptation behaviors that individuals undertake to cope with an IT and the antecedents and consequences of these appraisals. By utilizing the coping model of user adaptation, we theorize users\u27 IT adaptation behaviors as a coping process performed by individuals and investigate their coping appraisals that could affect job outcomes. Further, we theorize the moderating influence of personality traits on the relationship between situation-specific factors and coping appraisal. By analyzing these inquiries, this study provides a more informed way of conceptualizing the coping model of user adaptation, which influences the selection or preference of coping strategies and job outcomes

Associationer mellan föräldrars socioekonomiska status, samvetsgrannhet och hälsa hos studeranden på yrkesskola

This thesis sheds light on the associations between socioeconomic position, the personality trait of conscientiousness and health. While the positive association between socioeconomic position and health has been established, the mechanisms connecting the two remain to some part unclear. The goal of this thesis is to empirically assess the effects of parental socioeconomic position on adolescent and young adult health, through the mediator of adolescent and young adult conscientiousness. To explore these associations, correlation and regression analysis were utilized. This thesis utilizes data from the Let’s Move It intervention trial, a cluster-randomized parallel group trial intervention made to increase physical activity and reduce sedentary behavior of vocational upper secondary school students in the Helsinki metropolitan area. Utilizing the data from the Let’s Move It intervention trial, a measurement of parental socioeconomic position was formed as the highest parental educational attainment of either parent. To measure the personality trait of conscientiousness, a sum variable of two conscientiousness items from the ten-item personality inventory (TIPI) was constructed. General health was measured with self-rated health. Correlation and regression analysis between the three variables were conducted to investigate the associations. This thesis didn’t find statistically significant support for the hypothesis that parental educational attainment would predict adolescents’ and young adults’ conscientiousness. However, in line with previous research, the personality trait of conscientiousness was found to be a predictor of health for adolescents and young adults. Finally, and contrarily to the previous studies, the analysis found that parental educational attainment does not predict self-rated health in adolescents and young adults. As the analysis didn’t find support for all of the aforementioned hypotheses, the effect of parental socioeconomic position on adolescent and young adult health through adolescent and young adult conscientiousness was not assessed with a mediation analysis. The results of this thesis indicate that, as earlier studies have pointed out, the associations connecting conscientiousness, health and parental socioeconomic position are multifaceted, with many of them being bidirectional or having been indicated to form longer chains of variables acting as mediators and moderators. One reason for the results of this thesis being contrary to earlier studies might be unknown mediating and moderating effects. To increase the understanding of these complex relations in the future, both explorative research and studies that test earlier research are needed.Denna avhandling belyser sambandet mellan socioekonomisk status, personlighetsdraget samvetsgrannhet och hälsa. Även om den positiva associationen mellan socioekonomisk status och hälsa har bekräftats, är mekanismerna bakom associationen fortfarande dels okända. Målet för denna avhandling är att empiriskt undersöka effekten av föräldrarnas socioekonomiska status på ungdomars och unga vuxnas hälsa, genom den medierande variabeln samvetsgrannhet hos ungdomar och unga vuxna. För att studera sambanden mellan dessa variabler, utfördes korrelations- och regressionsanalys. Som data i denna avhandling utnyttjas data från Let's Move It -interventionen, vars mål var att öka fysisk aktivitet hos unga studeranden i yrkesskola. Genom att utnyttja datan från Let"s Move It interventionen, skapades en variabel av föräldrarnas högsta socioekonomiska status som den högsta föräldrarnas utbildningsnivå av föräldrarna. För att mäta personlighetsdraget samvetsgrannhet skapades en summavariabel av två frågor från TIPI (ten-item personality inventory) mätinstrumentet för personlighetsdrag. Hälsa mättes med hjäld av självuppskattad hälsa (self-rated health). Korrelations- och regressionsanalys utfördes för att undersöka associationen mellan de tre variablerna. Ingen statistiskt signifikant association hittades för hypotesen att föräldrarnas utbildningsnivå skulle förutsäga ungdomars och unga vuxnas samvetsgrannhet. I linje med tidigare forskning visades personlighetsdraget samvetsgrannhet förutse för hälsa hos ungdomar och unga vuxna. Till sist, och i motsats till tidigare studier, tydde analysen inte på att föräldrarnas utbildningsnivå skulle förutse självuppskattad hälsa (self-rated health) hos ungdomar och unga vuxna. Eftersom analysen inte hittade stöd för alla ovannämnda hypoteser, undersöktes inte effekten av föräldrarnas socioekonomiska status på ungdomars och unga vuxnas hälsa genom den medierande variabeln samvetsgrannhet hos ungdomar och unga vuxna. Resultaten av denna avhandling och tidigare studier tyder på att, sambanden mellan samvetsgrannhet, hälsa och föräldrarnas socioekonomiska status kan vara mångfacetterade komplexa och kan även bestå av kedjor av medierande och modererande variabler. En orsak till att resultatet i denna avhandling är motstridiga jämfört med tidigare studier, kan vara att mekanismerna mellan variablerna innehåller okända medierande och modererande variabler. För att öka förståelsen för dessa komplexa associationer i framtiden, behövs både explorativ forskning och studier som prövar tidigare forskning