The influence of personality traits and ICT use on the boundary management of home-based teleworkers

This mixed methods study contains two studies that are linked together sequentially to explore the work/nonwork boundary management of home-based teleworkers through the overarching research question: Do personality traits and ICT use influence how teleworkers manage their work-nonwork boundary? Mobile ICT s such as smartphones are becoming increasingly more important for work and they can have a boundary blurring effect on the work-nonwork boundary as they may be used at anytime and anywhere. However, the issue of how personality traits influence ICT use and work-nonwork boundary management has been neglected, particularly in a teleworking context. As people manage their work-nonwork boundaries differently and some people work better at home than others, it is not known to what extent personality traits play a role in boundary management and ICT use. Study One explores the relationships between the big five personality traits of conscientiousness, extraversion and neuroticism, the facet level traits of dutifulness, gregariousness, and impulsiveness and work/nonwork boundary interruptions. It also explores the relationships between these traits and frequency of technology use for work purposes and the relationship of ICT s (smartphones, tablets and laptops) to work/nonwork boundary interruptions. Data was collected via an online survey, with recruitment from social media sites and Local Authorities totalling 391 usable responses. Conscientiousness was found to be negatively related to work-nonwork and nonwork-work interruptions, dutifulness negatively related to nonwork-work interruptions, neuroticism positively related to work-nonwork interruptions and impulsiveness positively related to nonwork-work interruptions. Personality traits were found to have small correlations to boundary interruptions which was a new finding, although it was expected that the correlations might have been larger than they were found to be. Extraversion was positively related to frequency of laptop use and extraversion and gregariousness were positively related to frequency of smartphone use, neuroticism was negatively related to frequency of smartphone use which were new findings in a work context. Frequency of ICT use was positively related to work-nonwork interruptions, with smartphones showing the highest correlation, followed by tablet and then laptop displaying a stepped effect. This finding of a stepped effect was new and suggests that the portability of smartphones makes them much easier to connect to work out of hours, than laptops and tablets. The second study included interviews from 20 participants who had completed the survey, four from each of five boundary management groups (Strong Segmentors, Strong Integrators, Moderate Managers, Work Boundary Protectors and Family Boundary Protectors). The groups were derived from scores from the survey data, in order to investigate in more depth, other factors that influenced boundary management interruptions that were not picked up in Study One and specifically the idiosyncrasies of ICT use between groups. The qualitative data was analysed via Template Analysis and the final themes in the template were Boundary Management, Crafting Work, Individual Differences, Telework and Interruptions. The theme of Boundary Management was dealt with in this study. Some key findings were that Study Two built upon Study One by finding that proactivity was a key theme and that this trait may be particularly active while individuals are teleworking due to the context. ICT s were used in a way that reflected the wide ranging boundary management preferences of the individuals using them

School Activities that Employ ICT as a Resource to Facilitate Learning in a Student with ADHD

This work presents the results of a case study in which professionals work in collaboration to help a student with attention deficit with hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) learn physics. Two kinds of activities were analyzed: activities that include simulations and traditional ones. The attention span of the student in both kinds of activities was compared; in activities that include simulations this span was longer and the disruptive actions were less frequent. Due to this information, the use of simulations in physics learning activities oriented to students with ADHD proves revealing.Fil: Domínguez, María Alejandra. Universidad Nacional del Centro de la Provincia de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas. Grupo Educación en Ciencias con Tecnologías; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Tandil; ArgentinaFil: Menchón, Martín Alejandro. Universidad Nacional del Centro de la Provincia de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas. Instituto de Investigaciones en Tecnología Informática Avanzada; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Tandil; Argentin

Neurocognitive measures of impulsivity: explanatory, diagnostic and a prognostic role in obesity

Obesity is a growing public health problem with multiple aetiological factors. Behavioural determinants are likely to be key contributors to obesity, with a need for applied research in this field. Recently the obesity has been compared to food addiction with the connotation that obese individuals are impulsive in their behaviour. Impulsivity is a trait that is closely linked to addiction and has been studied in personality, psychiatry and more recently in the neurocognitive arena. A conceptual review of the construct of impulsivity identified inhibitory control (SST) and temporal discounting (TD) as two key behavioural constructs universal to all the key fields of impulsivity research. A systematic review of the literature supported their use to profile participants based on their Body Mass Index. The validity of the tools were proven by endophenotyping participants (N=202) of both normal weight and those seeking weight loss intervention. Both measures could successfully differentiate between obese and normal weight adolescents (N=85). The SST was also prognostic for short-term weight reduction in adolescents attending a lifestyle intervention, with the TD being able to predict weight loss maintenance at 6 months. The tasks could not differentiate significantly between adults of different weights but the TD was able to predict weight reduction after surgery (N=90). The modifiability of obesity through neuronal dopamine pathways was supported by a randomised controlled trial testing neurocognitive enhancement agents (N=40) against a placebo (N=40) in normal weight adults. Weight was also controlled by a commitment intervention targeting automatic impulsive behaviours (N=27). These findings support an association between impulsivity, obesity and weight reduction. The experimental inferences have been described in terms of a novel interconnected neuronal network, which leaves itself open to testing using functional brain imaging.Open Acces

Problematic Smartphone Use in Spanish and Italian University Students

Sustainable education requires the proper usage of technological devices. Among these is the smartphone, which is used by millions of young people around the world in today’s society. The objective of this study was to understand the smartphone usage profile of Spanish and Italian university students. It also aimed to identify possible problematic uses, and the differences in smartphone use (or abuse) between the participating subjects. The study was descriptive and comparative, with the intentional sampling of N = 1412 subjects studying at the education faculties of the University of Alicante (UA) and the Suor Orsola Benincasa University (UNISOB). A previously-validated questionnaire with 27 items was employed during the 2019–20 academic year. The data was analysed using the SPSS 25 programme. Descriptive and inferential analyses were carried out. The results obtained after the analysis of the data indicated that, of the four possible user types—occasional, habitual, at risk, and problematic—more than half of the sample identified themselves as habitual users. It can be concluded that there are significant differences between the universities: the UA students exhibited more problematic use than the UNISOB students. It is therefore necessary to prepare training programmes that are designed to avert problematic behaviours related to smartphone use.This work was supported by the Program Redes-I3CE of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor’s Office for Quality and Innovation of the University of Alicante, under Grant 4676—Smartphones as a resource for initial teacher training. Mobile learning or addiction? Two of the authors belong to the GIDU-EDUTIC/IN Research Group of the University of Alicante (VIGROB-330), and one author belongs to the GITE Research Group of the University of Murcia

Inhibition in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a developmental condition estimated to affect approximately 5.9 to 7.1 per cent of children and 5.29 per cent of adults worldwide (Willcutt, 2012). Whilst the aetiology of the disorder is unknown, ADHD is characterised by attention deficits, hyperactivity, and impulsivity. These symptoms often significantly impair an individual’s functioning in the domains of school, employment, home life, and general social settings. In this thesis, I investigated the effect of dysfunctional inhibition in individuals with ADHD. Specifically, bottom-up processes, such as motor inhibition, motor control, and attentional inertia, were investigated to see to what extent these processes are affected by inhibitory dysfunction. This essential process is impaired in individuals with ADHD. This was accomplished by a battery of tasks, including a motor inhibition task, two motor skills tasks, and an attentional inertia task. These tasks were indexed to a Stroop task to investigate the possibility of a general inhibitory dysfunction in both top-down and bottom-up processes. In addition, the motor inhibition and Stroop task were indexed to self-inventories commonly used to identify individuals with ADHD. Across these eight experiments, adolescent ADHD individuals, age-matched controls, and adults undertook various tasks designed to index automatic bottom-up motor inhibition. Results showed that, compared with controls, ADHD individuals did not exhibit usual levels of inhibition. However, higher-level cognitive inhibition, as measured with Stroop, was comparable with controls. Results also revealed a positive association, but not a statistically significant one, between the degree to which a person exhibits ADHD-like behaviour and the degree to which they lack automatic motor inhibition. I will later show that it is due to a specific diagnostic construct of ADHD that does not include motor difficulties. These data suggest that bottom-up inhibitory motor processes are an essential component of ADHD. I will argue that including dysfunctional motor inhibition complements current ADHD models, particularly those developed by Barkley (1997) and Nigg (2001)

Effects and applications of video games and virtual environments

The widespread use of virtual environments in today’s society leads to the importance of researching how using these virtual environments affect us, as well as how we can best use them. Video games are a very commonly used type of virtual environment/application of virtual environments. Video game research is rife with conflicting results, from studies into training, effects on emotion, to effects on visual attention. Chapter 2 considers the impacts of playing video games on visual attention and shows that the effects depend on the type of attentional process measured, and the video game genres played. Chapter 3 looks at how studies measure video game experience, and suggests a more sophisticated measure, including video game genres and platforms. This chapter also considers to what extent different video game genres are linked to different cognitive skills. Chapter 4 covers research between video game playing, task switching, and impulsivity. Chapter 5 shows that home video game playing (i.e. on home console platforms) affects both implicit memory and explicit memory, but mobile video game playing does not. Recent technological advances allowed the development of a newer form of virtual environment, virtual reality. Virtual reality has become more popular over the last few years in manufacturing and entertainment industries. However, studies into applying virtual reality to educational settings are limited. Chapter 6 presents a study that tests the effects of virtual reality on learning. The results show increased motivation and engagement with learning materials, when xxiv compared to learning with textbook-style or video materials. Chapter 7 compares learning in virtual reality, mixed reality and traditional lecture style modalities, and finds that participants report higher levels of engagement in both Virtual Reality and Mixed Reality conditions, and higher levels of positive emotions in the Virtual Reality condition. Implications for how individuals are affected by both of these types of virtual environments is discussed, including how they can be applied to learning