5,728 research outputs found
The Globalization of Artificial Intelligence: African Imaginaries of Technoscientific Futures
Imaginaries of artificial intelligence (AI) have transcended geographies of the Global North and become increasingly entangled with narratives of economic growth, progress, and modernity in Africa. This raises several issues such as the entanglement of AI with global technoscientific capitalism and its impact on the dissemination of AI in Africa. The lack of African perspectives on the development of AI exacerbates concerns of raciality and inclusion in the scientific research, circulation, and adoption of AI. My argument in this dissertation is that innovation in AI, in both its sociotechnical imaginaries and political economies, excludes marginalized countries, nations and communities in ways that not only bar their participation in the reception of AI, but also as being part and parcel of its creation.
Underpinned by decolonial thinking, and perspectives from science and technology studies and African studies, this dissertation looks at how AI is reconfiguring the debate about development and modernization in Africa and the implications for local sociotechnical practices of AI innovation and governance. I examined AI in international development and industry across Kenya, Ghana, and Nigeria, by tracing Canada’s AI4D Africa program and following AI start-ups at AfriLabs. I used multi-sited case studies and discourse analysis to examine the data collected from interviews, participant observations, and documents.
In the empirical chapters, I first examine how local actors understand the notion of decolonizing AI and show that it has become a sociotechnical imaginary. I then investigate the political economy of AI in Africa and argue that despite Western efforts to integrate the African AI ecosystem globally, the AI epistemic communities in the continent continue to be excluded from dominant AI innovation spaces. Finally, I examine the emergence of a Pan-African AI imaginary and argue that AI governance can be understood as a state-building experiment in post-colonial Africa. The main issue at stake is that the lack of African perspectives in AI leads to negative impacts on innovation and limits the fair distribution of the benefits of AI across nations, countries, and communities, while at the same time excludes globally marginalized epistemic communities from the imagination and creation of AI
A review of abnormal behavior detection in activities of daily living
Abnormal behavior detection (ABD) systems are built to automatically identify and recognize abnormal behavior from various input data types, such as sensor-based and vision-based input. As much as the attention received for ABD systems, the number of studies on ABD in activities of daily living (ADL) is limited. Owing to the increasing rate of elderly accidents in the home compound, ABD in ADL research should be given as much attention to preventing accidents by sending out signals when abnormal behavior such as falling is detected. In this study, we compare and contrast the formation of the ABD system in ADL from input data types (sensor-based input and vision-based input) to modeling techniques (conventional and deep learning approaches). We scrutinize the public datasets available and provide solutions for one of the significant issues: the lack of datasets in ABD in ADL. This work aims to guide new research to understand the field of ABD in ADL better and serve as a reference for future study of better Ambient Assisted Living with the growing smart home trend
Reframing data ethics in research methods education: a pathway to critical data literacy
This paper presents an ethical framework designed to support the development of critical data literacy for research methods courses and data training programmes in higher education. The framework we present draws upon our reviews of literature, course syllabi and existing frameworks on data ethics. For this research we reviewed 250 research methods syllabi from across the disciplines, as well as 80 syllabi from data science programmes to understand how or if data ethics was taught. We also reviewed 12 data ethics frameworks drawn from different sectors. Finally, we reviewed an extensive and diverse body of literature about data practices, research ethics, data ethics and critical data literacy, in order to develop a transversal model that can be adopted across higher education. To promote and support ethical approaches to the collection and use of data, ethics training must go beyond securing informed consent to enable a critical understanding of the techno-centric environment and the intersecting hierarchies of power embedded in technology and data. By fostering ethics as a method, educators can enable research that protects vulnerable groups and empower communities
Coworking through the Pandemic: Flexibly Yours
Coworking can be defined as a paid for service (usually) providing shared workspace and amenities to users. When the pandemic hit, owing to the business model’s in-person foundations of physical proximity and shared amenities, the coworking industry was expected to be seriously impacted. Yet fast forward, and as the pandemic has played out, coworking businesses are uniquely positioned in this uncertain and changing workscape.
This dissertation presents one of the first academic explorations into how independent coworking businesses fared in the initial year of the pandemic. Specifically, the research explores the following questions:
1. How did independent coworking businesses manage and adapt to the pandemic?
2. What is virtual coworking and what are the experiences of workers in these virtual coworking spaces?
3. How does coworking flexibility affect social support and connection?
Using a critically interpretive poststructural approach, this ethnography included virtual fieldwork and interviews. Sixty hours of virtual participant observation and 30 loosely structured interviews were conducted with coworking stakeholders (i.e., owner-operators, managers, and users) over videoconferencing platforms. Secondary data included written fieldnotes and coworking documents.
Results capture the strategies used by coworking business owner-operators and managers to sustain their businesses and the attendant relationships with coworking users, irrespective of whether or not a physical location could be provided under pandemic lockdowns. Given the expansion of coworking businesses into virtual service offerings, a key contribution of my research is the finding that co-location in a physical coworking space is not necessary to cultivate vibes and a sense of community. By removing the physical infrastructure of coworking, the virtual coworking product in which I participated points to both a reinforcement of and an emphasis on the centrality of social connection, support, and community. By de-centering the priority of a physical co-location, I conceptualize coworking businesses as commodified support infrastructures—affective atmospheres produced through the entanglement of human bodies, other living things, objects, and technologies in a space.
In viewing coworking businesses as fluid affective atmospheres of support, my research adds to the emerging coworking scholarship that attends to the atmospheric qualities of coworking, the role of affective labour, and the possibilities of encounters and interactions as bodies, objects, and technologies interconnect. My results reinforce the deep ambivalence of coworking, capturing tensions between productivity and sociality, and a blurring of boundaries between professional and private, and work and leisure. The analysis also suggests that the inherent flexibility, informality, turnover, and autonomy in coworking practices can make creating stable social connections and support difficult. Finally, the COVID-19 crisis brought to light how coworking lies primarily outside the scope of current employment legislation, which includes occupational health and safety, employment standards, and workers’ compensation. In the absence of well-defined policy directions, coworking business owner-operators and managers made individualized decisions, thereby ultimately downloading further risk and responsibility onto their coworking users
2023-2024 Boise State University Undergraduate Catalog
This catalog is primarily for and directed at students. However, it serves many audiences, such as high school counselors, academic advisors, and the public. In this catalog you will find an overview of Boise State University and information on admission, registration, grades, tuition and fees, financial aid, housing, student services, and other important policies and procedures. However, most of this catalog is devoted to describing the various programs and courses offered at Boise State
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
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
Artificial Intelligence, Robots, and Philosophy
This book is a collection of all the papers published in the special issue “Artificial Intelligence, Robots, and Philosophy,” Journal of Philosophy of Life, Vol.13, No.1, 2023, pp.1-146. The authors discuss a variety of topics such as science fiction and space ethics, the philosophy of artificial intelligence, the ethics of autonomous agents, and virtuous robots. Through their discussions, readers are able to think deeply about the essence of modern technology and the future of humanity. All papers were invited and completed in spring 2020, though because of the Covid-19 pandemic and other problems, the publication was delayed until this year. I apologize to the authors and potential readers for the delay. I hope that readers will enjoy these arguments on digital technology and its relationship with philosophy. ***
Contents***
Introduction
: Descartes and Artificial Intelligence;
Masahiro Morioka***
Isaac Asimov and the Current State of Space Science Fiction
: In the Light of Space Ethics;
Shin-ichiro Inaba***
Artificial Intelligence and Contemporary Philosophy
: Heidegger, Jonas, and Slime Mold;
Masahiro Morioka***
Implications of Automating Science
: The Possibility of Artificial Creativity and the Future of Science;
Makoto Kureha***
Why Autonomous Agents Should Not Be Built for War;
István Zoltán Zárdai***
Wheat and Pepper
: Interactions Between Technology and Humans;
Minao Kukita***
Clockwork Courage
: A Defense of Virtuous Robots;
Shimpei Okamoto***
Reconstructing Agency from Choice;
Yuko Murakami***
Gushing Prose
: Will Machines Ever be Able to Translate as Badly as
Humans?;
Rossa Ó Muireartaigh**
Intelligent computing : the latest advances, challenges and future
Computing is a critical driving force in the development of human civilization. In recent years, we have witnessed the emergence of intelligent computing, a new computing paradigm that is reshaping traditional computing and promoting digital revolution in the era of big data, artificial intelligence and internet-of-things with new computing theories, architectures, methods, systems, and applications. Intelligent computing has greatly broadened the scope of computing, extending it from traditional computing on data to increasingly diverse computing paradigms such as perceptual intelligence, cognitive intelligence, autonomous intelligence, and human computer fusion intelligence. Intelligence and computing have undergone paths of different evolution and development for a long time but have become increasingly intertwined in recent years: intelligent computing is not only intelligence-oriented but also intelligence-driven. Such cross-fertilization has prompted the emergence and rapid advancement of intelligent computing
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The Role of Interactive Web Broadcasts in Fostering Distance Learning Students’ Engagement with Practical Lab and Fieldwork
Practical work in science and technology disciplines is crucial for students’ understanding and mastery. For educators who teach those disciplines at a distance and for students who learn remotely, this endeavour may be challenging.
The study presented in this thesis investigates the use of Interactive Web Broadcasts (IWBs) in five undergraduate practical science and technology modules at The Open University. The study examines the reasons for using IWBs, as well as the strategies and types of interactions that staff and students use to engage and interact with one another. The study gathered perspectives from academics (n=18); associate lecturers (n=10); technical production team (n=3); students (n=88), and an external guest expert about the purposes, strategies and motivations of participating in IWBs. The study used a qualitatively mixed-methods design. An adapted protocol of Flanders’s Interaction Analysis Categories was used to analyse the interaction patterns in the web broadcast transcripts and text-chat logs, and a discourse analysis coding scheme was applied to analyse the text-chat. Student online questionnaires were administered towards the end of the modules to capture the student perceptions of IWBs. Student interviews and staff focus groups were also conducted to gain a fuller picture of experiences of using and engaging with IWBs.
Findings show that the purposes and aims of using IWBs are to facilitate student engagement, foster a sense of community, and demonstrate an authentic practice of the sciences in real-world contexts. The communicative strategies were primarily affective and met students’ interests and expectations. The IWBs mitigated feelings of isolation that are common in distance education environments. IWBs had positive impacts on professional teaching practices and fostered collegiality and collaboration among staff. The findings are relevant to other distance and traditional campus-based universities that teach practical science and technology, those who teach online using synchronous technology-mediated systems, and those who are interested in student engagement and practical work
A systematic review of literature on occupational health and safety interventions for older workers
As the global population ages there is an imperative to enhance labour participation of older workers in ways that support good physical and psychological health. However, there is limited guidance for organisations on how to do this effectively. This systematic review examined literature identified through four databases and a targeted web-search, yielding 39 PRISMA records (32 scholarly, seven grey literature) reporting workplace interventions aimed at improving the injury outcomes of older workers. The review revealed that organisational and composite interventions may be most effective, although an absence of robust research in this area and a scarcity of empirical evidence-based interventions known to improve injury outcomes for older workers was noted. Responding to these shortcomings, this article presents ‘A future research agenda for older worker health, safety and well-being interventions.’ This systems-based approach has a dual focus on organisational and composite interventions combined with robust research design
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