Attendance to Massive Open On-line Courses: Towards a Solution to Track on-line Recorded Lectures Viewing

Massive open on-line courses (MOOC) suchas those by edX.org are digital courses where thousands students are dispersed across the Internet. This new variant for distance learning opens many new challenges including the need to verify the real vision of recorded lectures same as we control the physical presence of scholars in a traditional classroom. We review here a precursor study on the effectiveness of the new Pinvox system (i.e., “Personal Identification Number by Voice”), that aims to ensure“on-line attendance”by confirming that a particular student has actually listened to and watched a complete video lecture

Just a Chemical Imbalance: Exploring the Absence of the Social Etiology of Depression in Common Medical Websites

In recent decades, depression has received increased attention in the United States. As diagnosed instances of depression rise, and as it has usurped all other conditions in both national and global disability costs, pressure continues to mount to address and mitigate the societal impacts of this seemingly unstoppable disease. While this has taken various forms, from campaigns to destigmatize mental illness to government entities devoting to reducing social costs of depression, the prevailing narrative proves incomplete. Despite a wealth of research supporting a direct link between social factors (such as life satisfaction and relational satisfaction) and instances of clinical depression, the predominant US paradigm surrounding this illness focuses almost exclusively on the biomedical model. This paper first presents a review of the literature in support of a social etiology of depression, and then compares that substantiated research to the language used on popular medical websites such as WebMD. Consequences of the disparity between the established research of what causes depression and mainstream public narrative are explored

Nudged to a menu position: the role of “I’m Loving It”!

Erworben im Rahmen der Schweizer Nationallizenzen (http://www.nationallizenzen.ch)The position of food items on supermarket shelves or dishes on restaurant menus seems to influence consumers’ choices. However, it is still unclear which position is the most favourable, respectively which factor can explain the variety of different position effects observed (e.g., centre-stage effect). We assume that this factor is based on whether or not “your love” (or your preference) for the cuisine of the restaurant (e.g., Italian) where you have dinner plays a role regarding your dish choice or not. Hence, in a computer-based study, participants had to choose dishes, appetizers, entrées and desserts from menus whose cuisine they most (e.g., Italian) or least preferred (e.g., Japanese). We found that regarding the meal type entrées, preference indeed played a role. Regarding menus from their most preferred cuisine, participants chose significantly more often entrées positioned in the centre of the menu. No such effect could be found regarding menus from their least preferred cuisine. Regarding the meal type appetizer, preference did not seem to play a role; hence, participants did, regarding both preferences, choose more appetizers positioned at the top of the menu. Regarding desserts, no effects could be found. A developed theoretical framework tries to illustrate how preference comes into play, by changing the way the dishes within a meal type are perceived, and hence modulates the different position effects observed. The framework should provide choice architects with guidelines about where they could place healthier dishes on a menu to fight the current overweight and obesity crisis

Research on Users’ Perceived Beliefs from the Perspective of Review Components

In the Internet era, how the review system brings user good experiences and influences users’ perceived beliefs has become an important issue. Based on word-of-mouth and user perception theory, this article builds the model between four characteristics of the review components (integrity, intelligent extraction, operability and social interaction) and four types of users’ perceived beliefs (perceived usefulness, reliability, convenience and pleasure). Also, this study makes analysis of 101 questionnaires, which shows that integrity, intelligent extraction has a positive influence on perceived usefulness; intelligent extraction and operability have a positive influence on perceived convenience; operability and social interaction have a positive influence on perceived pleasure; and social interaction has a positive influence on perceived reliability. According to these research results, user awareness and the performance of review components can be improved through measures to meet users’ demand in practice

Change management study of horticulture 2015 - Conditions and success factors

The increasing organizational size, as a result of the industry's structural change, is leading to crises in German horticultural companies. Therefore, the present study examines the causes of fundamental change processes in horticultural companies, indicates the overriding trends and identifies the success factors of change initiatives. For this purpose, over 150 decision-makers with over 10 years’ experience in their respective organization were surveyed from May to December 2014. The megatrends are environmental issues, changed consumer behavior, resource shortages and the labor market. Currently, the reasons for change lie in a changing market strategy/sales approach, business succession and submission and external changes in the legal conditions. Among the most difficult problems occurring in the implementation of change processes are low willingness to take responsibility, interest and goal conflicts of the involved organization's members and a sacrifice of long-term actions for short-term profit improvements. The most important success factors of change processes include realistic, clear visions/goals and their communication, team spirit and motivation and a coordinated chronological procedure. Six factors of the psychological level of the change success are presented. The results of the study can help to recommend a design for change processes in companies within horticultural manufacturing. This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of Organisational Transformation & Social Change on 2016-06-28, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14779633.2016.1192811