HCI expertise needed! Personalisation and feedback optimisation in online education

Two key challenges in education relate to how traditional educational providers can personalise online provisions to the students’ skill level, optimise the use of tools and increase both the generation and utilisation of feedback (in terms of timing, content, and subsequent use by students). The application of traditional programmes in the online setting is often complicated by the legacy of traditional universities infrastructures, knowledge bases (or lack thereof in the human-computer-interaction/HCI realm), and pedagogical priorities. It is here that HCI experts (designers and researchers) can have real-world impact in line with macro-HCI, while also being able to test new innovations in collaboration with educators (e.g., the practitioners in such education settings). In this note, we make a case that the HCI community is in a situation where it can make a significant contribution to traditional providers in two prospective areas: personalisation, feedback generation and increased feedback utilisation

PMO managers' self-determined participation in a purposeful virtual community-of-practice

Communities-of-practice (CoPs) have received significant attention within a variety of literatures but we remain largely ignorant of the potential of purposefully-created CoPs in global organisations. In this context, the challenge is likely to be convincing ‘masters’ (Wenger, 1998) on the merits of joining the conversation on practice at a distance, thus making the willingness for exchange a key to the quality and longevity of the community. We posed the question “Why would busy, dispersed, knowledgeable professionals want to join and participate in a deliberately-organised CoP?” Our 2-year collaborative action study allowed us to observe the CoP and its membership at close range. We conclude that autonomy, competence and belonging underscore participation, co-production and diffusion of innovative problem-solving and practice beyond the CoP. The study will inform organisations contemplating similar interventions and also serves as a basis for further investigation and theory building on organized CoPs by the research community

Learning in a blended learning environment: needs and influencing factors

In blended learning, students have the opportunity to choose either online or classroom lectures. For higher education institutions, blended learning has many advantages, such as accessibility to students and teachers, cost efficiency, alleviation of the teacher shortage, etc. But what does this mean for the students? The aim of the study is to find out students' further need for blended learning, its reasons and factors influencing it. An online survey was conducted to answer the research questions. The collected data was analyzed by using statistical analysis methods. The results of the survey revealed that the technical prerequisites for students to participate in blended learning were met. The biggest problems are related to the self-regulation skills of students. Problems with blended learning are stronger among first-year students. However, the respondents were rather positive about blended learning. Blended learning is most strongly supported by distance learning students who live far from university and are over 25 years old. The least supportive of blended learning are full-time students living near of the university and who are under the age of 25. This is due to the fact that full-time students experience blended learning problems on average more often than distance students because of the weaker learning skills. The results of the survey help to understand students' views on blended learning, to plan and conduct studies in a student-friendly way, and to plan trainings for teachers to improve the blended learning process

Pair programming teams and high-quality knowledge sharing: A comparative study of coopetitive reward structures

© 2015, Springer Science+Business Media New York. There has been a growing research interest in understanding knowledge sharing in agile development. Yet, empirical research that sheds light on its underlying practices, such as pair programming, is evolving. This study uses insights from coopetition and software literature to focus inquiry on the relation between coopetitive rewards and high-quality knowledge sharing in pair programming teams. Theoretical hypotheses are developed and validated, suggesting that: ‘coopetitive rewards influence high-quality knowledge sharing both directly and over time through their impact on the level of knowledge sharing satisfaction’, and, ‘the impact of coopetitive rewards on high-quality knowledge sharing is dependent upon task complexity and the history of working under similar reward structure’. This study generates new understanding related to the use of rewards in pair programming teams, and offers a rigorous and replicable seven-step experimental process for simulating coopetitive structures and investigating their role in pair programming and in similar collaborative contexts

The Effects of Social Capital on Chinese Consumers’ Online Impulse Buying in Social Commerce Environment

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of social capital including social interaction shared language and trust on Chinese consumer online impulse buying in social commerce platforms To verify the hypothesis we surveyed the Chinese customers who have buying experiences of using social commerce by snowball sampling technique After analyzing 548 valid data we confirmed that three dimensions of social capital social interaction shared language and trust positively affects both peer intrinsic motivation and peer extrinsic motivation In addition peer motivation exerts a positively impact on consumer impulse purchases on social commerce The findings not only provide a new theoretical perspective for studying consumers impulse buying behavior in theory but also have important implications for the online sellers in their follower s groups to improve online marketin

Credibility of Health Information and Digital Media: New Perspectives and Implications for Youth

Part of the Volume on Digital Media, Youth, and Credibility. This chapter considers the role of Web technologies on the availability and consumption of health information. It argues that young people are largely unfamiliar with trusted health sources online, making credibility particularly germane when considering this type of information. The author suggests that networked digital media allow for humans and technologies act as "apomediaries" that can be used to steer consumers to high quality health information, thereby empowering health information seekers of all ages

Beyond Just Money Transactions: Redesigning Digital Peer-to-Peer Payments for Social Connections

Financial activities, such as the exchange of money between individuals, have long been considered a crucial aspect of how people build and maintain their interpersonal relationships (i.e., a strong, deep, or close association/acquaintance between two or more people) with individuals they know because money is a sensitive social construct. In particular, over the past decade, how to conduct, manage, and experience money exchanges and processes between individuals has been dramatically transformed due to the increasing popularity of digital peer-to-peer (P2P) payment services (i.e., performing one to one online money transactions via a digital device). In this sense, digital P2P payments have shown the potential to affect how people pay and interact with each other regarding money, an important impact factor on various forms of interpersonal relationships, by facilitating direct money transactions between individuals through computer-mediated channels. Therefore, this dissertation research is motivated to leverage a sociotechnical approach to conduct an in-depth investigation of the nuanced human experiences of personal money exchanges mediated by digital P2P payments between people who know each other and the unique role of digital P2P payments in shaping these individuals\u27 social connections with each other online and offline. In doing so, this dissertation research aims to (i) reveal and elaborate the multidimensional influences of digital P2P payments on interpersonal relationships between people who already know each other in terms of both experiences of money exchanges and everyday social interactions; ii) advance our knowledge and understanding of how digital P2P payments systems can be redesigned to better support people\u27s social connections with individuals they know; and iii) envision the future landscape of digital P2P payments in our increasingly networked digital society. This dissertation research involves four studies. Grounded in 158 social media posts and 8 interviews, Study 1 explores how people perceive the increasing trend of integrating digital P2P payments with social media services (e.g., Facebook Messenger payment) and why they decide not to use this service in their daily lives. Study 2 reports findings of a qualitative study of 31 in-depth semi-structured interviews to investigate the influences of using digital P2P payments on people\u27s offline interpersonal relationships. Study 3 reports results of a large-scale anonymous online survey with 218 valid responses to measure the specific immediate social consequences and lasting impacts of using digital P2P payments on people\u27s interpersonal relationships. Study 4 adopts the research through design (RtD) approach with a specific emphasis on participatory design activities to both elicit and qualitatively investigate user needs and user-generated design solutions for digital P2P payment services that can better support people\u27s social connections. This dissertation research thus contributes to innovating financial technologies in the perspective of Human-Computer Interaction and Human-Centered Computing by better understanding new and more complicated social phenomena and dynamics emerging in today\u27s digital economy. First, this dissertation research offers one of the first empirical evidence to unpack and explicate the multidimensional influences of digital P2P payments on both financial experiences/processes and everyday social connections between known contacts, which is understudied in prior scholarship. In doing so, we provide new perspectives on today\u27s technology-mediated financial life and shed light on the intertwining financial and social relationships through technology. These insights also help re-conceptualize computer-mediated interpersonal relationships in today\u27s networked society. Second, we identify and further reflect on user-generated design recommendations and develop prototypes that highlight the importance of taking the interplay of financial and social engagement, in addition to security and privacy, into consideration when redesigning digital P2P payments platforms. Through this RtD approach, we thus rethink and envision the future landscape of digital P2P payments where such technologies can be designed, developed, and used in a more comfortable, innovative, and emotionally satisfactory way. As we are entering a post COVID-19 pandemic age, there is an increasing interest to make digital financial technologies not only secure but also more human-centered, interaction-centric, and culturally sensitive, which can be used to better support and maintain human connections through daily financial activities with or without face-to-face interaction. Therefore, in a broader sense, this dissertation research on the social values of digital P2P payments also contributes to building a more robust and inclusive digital economy in today\u27s changing society

Enhancing the E-Commerce Experience through Haptic Feedback Interaction

The sense of touch is important in our everyday lives and its absence makes it difficult to explore and manipulate everyday objects. Existing online shopping practice lacks the opportunity for physical evaluation, that people often use and value when making product choices. However, with recent advances in haptic research and technology, it is possible to simulate various physical properties such as heaviness, softness, deformation, and temperature. The research described here investigates the use of haptic feedback interaction to enhance e-commerce product evaluation, particularly haptic weight and texture evaluation. While other properties are equally important, besides being fundamental to the shopping experience of many online products, weight and texture can be simulated using cost-effective devices. Two initial psychophysical experiments were conducted using free motion haptic exploration in order to more closely resemble conventional shopping. One experiment was to measure weight force thresholds and another to measure texture force thresholds. The measurements can provide better understanding of haptic device limitation for online shopping in terms of the availability of different stimuli to represent physical products. The outcomes of the initial psychophysical experimental studies were then used to produce various absolute stimuli that were used in a comparative experimental study to evaluate user experience of haptic product evaluation. Although free haptic exploration was exercised on both psychophysical experiments, results were relatively consistent with previous work on haptic discrimination. The threshold for weight force discrimination represented as downward forces was 10 percent. The threshold for texture force discrimination represented as friction forces was 14.1 percent, when using dynamic coefficient of friction at any level of static coefficient of friction. On the other hand, the comparative experimental study to evaluate user experience of haptic product information indicated that haptic product evaluation does not change user performance significantly. However, although there was an increase in the time taken to complete the task, the number of button click actions tended to decrease. The results showed that haptic product evaluation could significantly increase the confidence of shopping decision. Nevertheless, the availability of haptic product evaluation does not necessarily impose different product choices but it complements other selection criteria such as price and appearance. The research findings from this work are a first step towards exploring haptic-based environments in e-commerce environments. The findings not only lay the foundation for designing online haptic shopping but also provide empirical support to research in this direction

Social features of Web Assisted Tobacco Interventions (WATIS) : case studies

textWeb Assisted Tobacco Interventions (WATIs) are proliferating due to their cost effectiveness and their compatibility with a fast-paced lifestyle that needs to be time and space detached. Following a general trend in web assisted interventions, WATIs are increasingly incorporating social media features. Often though, because they are added post-facto to a solid preexisting foundation that privileges information delivery, the social media and the informational sections are developed independently: the social component has no impact on the informational content. This forms the basis of this study, which proposes to do a detailed analysis of a WATI recommended by a panel of experts in the area of smoking cessation. An emphasis will be given to the visibility of social media features and the degree to which content from the social media component contributed by users impacts the informational component generated by content experts. This analysis will be supported by instruments for data collection especially adapted/designed for this study. This dissertation proposal is at the cusp of disciplinary boundaries as its theoretical underpinnings are in the intersections of three domains: design, health, and social media. This interdisciplinary approach is necessarily reflected in the study's conceptual vii framework, which draws from constructs such as "design with intent", tailored health interventions, and social networks for participatory culture. As a result of the detailed analysis, and the author's own expertise in social media across other fields, a set of recommendations will be proposed for the design of WATIs with social features aiming at a greater impact of these on the evidence-based informational content.Radio-Television-Fil