Studying and Modeling the Connection between People's Preferences and Content Sharing

People regularly share items using online social media. However, people's decisions around sharing---who shares what to whom and why---are not well understood. We present a user study involving 87 pairs of Facebook users to understand how people make their sharing decisions. We find that even when sharing to a specific individual, people's own preference for an item (individuation) dominates over the recipient's preferences (altruism). People's open-ended responses about how they share, however, indicate that they do try to personalize shares based on the recipient. To explain these contrasting results, we propose a novel process model of sharing that takes into account people's preferences and the salience of an item. We also present encouraging results for a sharing prediction model that incorporates both the senders' and the recipients' preferences. These results suggest improvements to both algorithms that support sharing in social media and to information diffusion models.Comment: CSCW 201

The Impact of Cultural Familiarity on Students’ Social Media Usage in Higher Education

Using social media (SM) in Higher education (HE) becomes unavoidable in the new teaching and learning pedagogy. The current generation of students creates their groups on SM for collaboration. However, SM can be a primary source of learning distraction due to its nature, which does not support structured learning. Hence, derived from the literature, this study proposes three learning customised system features, to be implemented on SM when used in Higher Education HE. Nevertheless, some psychological factors appear to have a stronger impact on students’ adoption of SM in learning than the proposed features. A Quantitative survey was conducted at a university in Uzbekistan to collect 52 undergraduate students’ perception of proposed SM learning customised features in Moodle. These features aim to provide localised, personalised, and privacy control self-management environment for collaboration in Moodle. These features could be significant in predicting students’ engagement with SM in HE. The data analysis showed a majority of positive feedback towards the proposed learning customised SM. However, the surveyed students’ engagement with these features was observed as minimal. The course leader initiated a semi-structured interview to investigate the reason. Although the students confirmed their acceptance of the learning customised features, their preferences to alternate SM, which is Telegram overridden their usage of the proposed learning customized SM, which is Twitter. The students avoided the Moodle integrated Twitter (which provided highly accepted features) and chose to use the Telegram as an external collaboration platform driven by their familiarity and social preferences with the Telegram since it is the popular SM in Uzbekistan. This study is part of an ongoing PhD research which involves deeper frame of learners’ cognitive usage of the learning management system. However, this paper exclusively discusses the cultural familiarity impact of student’s adoption of SM in HE

Understanding infants' and children's social learning about foods: Previous research and new prospects

Developmental psychologists have devoted significant attention to investigating how children learn from others' actions, emotions, and testimony. Yet most of this research has examined children's socially guided learning about artifacts. The present article focuses on a domain that has received limited attention from those interested in the development of social cognition: food. We begin by reviewing the available literature on infants' and children's development in the food domain and identify situations in which children evidence both successes and failures in their interactions with foods. We focus specifically on the role that other people play in guiding what children eat and argue that understanding patterns of successes and failures in the food domain requires an appreciation of eating as a social phenomenon. We next propose a series of questions for future research and suggest that examining food selection as a social phenomenon can shed light on mechanisms underlying children's learning from others and provide ideas for promoting healthy social relationships and eating behaviors early in development

Modeling usage of an online research community

Although online communities have been thought of as a new way for collaboration across geographic boundaries in the scientific world, they have a problem attracting people to keep visiting. The main purpose of this study is to understand how people behave in such communities, and to build and evaluate tools to stimulate engagement in a research community. These tools were designed based on a research framework of factors that influence online participation and relationship development. There are two main objectives for people to join an online community, information sharing and interpersonal relationship development, such as friends or colleagues. The tools designed in this study are to serve both information sharing and interpersonal relationship development needs. The awareness tool is designed to increase the sense of a community and increase the degree of social presence of members in the community. The recommender system is designed to help provide higher quality and personalized information to community members. It also helps to match community members into subgroups based on their interests. The designed tools were implemented in a field site - the Asynchronous Learning Networks (ALN) Research community. A longitudinal field study was used to evaluate the effectiveness of the designed tools. This research explored people\u27s behavior inside a research community by analyzing web server logs. The results show that although there are not many interactions in the community space, the WebCenter has been visited extensively by its members. There are over 2,000 hits per day on average and over 5,000 article accesses during the observation period. This research also provided a framework to identify factors that affect people\u27s engagement in an online community. The research framework was tested using the PLS modeling method with online survey responses. The results show that perceived usefulness performs a very significant role in members\u27 intention to continue using the system and their perceived preliminary networking. The results also show that the quality of the content of the system is a strong indicator for both perceived usefulness of the community space and perceived ease of use of the community system. Perceived ease of use did not show a strong correlation with intention to continue use which was consistent with other studies of Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). For the ALN research community, this online community helps its members to broaden their contacts, improve the quality and quantity of their research, and increase the dissemination of knowledge among community members

Investigating consumer perception of sustainable purchase: Examining correlations between food habits and innovation

Awareness of our eating habits impact on health and the environment is growing, along with its consequential effects. It is critical for individuals to acquire knowledge in this realm, learning to thoughtfully assess their daily consumption and actively participate in the process. The analyzed sample comprises responses from 202 respondents, providing a global overview of people's attitudes toward adopting sustainable food products. Therefore, this study aims to investigate consumers' perceptions of green products and their willingness to integrate them into their dietary practices. It will explore how certain variables, such as health consciousness and trust in the integrity of food products, positively influence purchase intention through the mediating factors of green environmental concerns. Additionally, perceived barriers, which negatively impact purchase intention but are positively associated with confidence in product integrity, will also be examined. The results demonstrate consumers' willingness to embrace new messages that help overcome barriers to purchasing sustainable products, as well as responsibility on the part of companies in understanding how to effectively promote environmental aspects through tangible actions

Generation Z : influencers of decision-making process : the influence of WOM and Peer interaction in the decision-making process

Young people comprise a lucrative market for many goods and influence adult spending patterns. Generation Z is the first generation who has grown up in the middle of an era of developed information technology, being one of the most critical users of SNS, constantly engaging in online exchanging of information and conversation among its peers. The study of this generation’s current behaviors is an opportunity for marketers to get to know them, understanding the best way to target them, comprehending their preferences and influencers through their decision-making process. Trough studying the effect of Peer Interaction and WOM throughout the decision-making process, it will be possible to uncover key influencers of Generation Z. A survey was designed to understand consumer preferences, and data was analyzed through Confirmatory Factor Analysis and Structural Modeling Equations, using the statistical software SPSS AMOS 21.0. The results show that Peer Interaction positively influences Generation Z’s decision-making, most predominantly in the first stages of the process, while the influence of WOM was not statistically supported. Further influencers should be considered in the future, to uncover what may drive Generation Z’s decisions, so that marketers can develop more accurate strategies to best target this younger generation

Role of Social Media Marketing in Building CauseOriented Campaigns

This study investigates the intricate interplay between social media marketing strategies and the success of cause-oriented campaigns. Focusing on the Lebanese context, the research examines how Audience Engagement, Content Strategy, and Influencer Collaboration impact the effectiveness of cause-oriented programs. A quantitative approach is employed, with data collected through an online survey distributed to over 100 respondents in Lebanon. The analysis employs regression analysis to explore the relationships between the predictors and the outcome variable. The findings underscore the pivotal role of Audience Engagement, well-crafted Content Strategies, and strategic collaboration with Influencers in driving the success of cause-oriented campaigns. While shedding light on these critical factors, the study also reveals the limitations and challenges associated withimplementing such campaigns in the Lebanese context. The insights from this research contribute to a deeper understanding of the dynamics involved in leveraging social media marketing for causeoriented initiatives, offering practical recommendations for practitioners in the field.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Mobile Social Networking aided content dissemination in heterogeneous networks

Since more and more mobile applications are based on the proliferation of social information, the study of Mobile Social Net-works (MSNs) combines social sciences and wireless communications. Operating wireless networks more efficiently by exploiting social relationships between MSN users is an appealing but challenging option for network operators. An MSN-aided content dissemination technique is presented as a potential ex-tension of conventional cellular wireless net-works in order to satisfy growing data traffic. By allowing the MSN users to create a self-organized ad hoc network for spontaneously disseminating contents, the network operator may be able to reduce the operational costs and simultaneously achieve an improved network performance. In this paper, we first summarize the basic features of the MSN architecture, followed by a survey of the factors which may affect MSN-aided content dissemination. Using a case study, we demonstrate that one can save resources of the Base Station (BS) while substantially lowering content dissemination delay. Finally, other potential applications of MSN-aided content dissemination are introduced, and a range of future challenges are summarized

The influence of WOM and peer interaction in the decision-making process of Generation Z within the family

Generation Z is the first generation who has grown up in the middle of an era of developed information technology, being one of the most critical users of social networking sites (SNS), constantly engaging in online exchanging of information and conversation between peers. The study of this generation’s consumer behaviors is an opportunity for marketers to get to know their preferences, identify the major influences on their decision-making process, and understand how to target them more effectively. In this paper, we designed a survey to study the effect of peer interaction and word-of-mouth (WOM) on the different stages of Generation Z’s decision-making process, and to understand how this generation’s preferences are formed. Data was analyzed through Confirmatory Factor Analysis and Structural Equations Modeling. Results showed that peer interaction positively influences Generation Z’s decision-making, most predominantly in the first stages of the process, while the influence of WOM was not statistically supported. Other factors should be considered in the future, to uncover the different determinants of generation Z’s decisions, so that marketers can develop more accurate strategies to best target this younger generation.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Support needs and experiences of young people living in families with mental illness

Introduction: Children and adolescents living in families affected by mental illness are at elevated risk of developing mental health problems. A range of interventions have been designed to help these young people; however, the effectiveness of these programs is, in some cases, mixed. Our aim was to understand in detail the support needs and experiences of a group of Australian children and adolescents living in families with mental illness. Methods: Our study is a qualitative in nature. In 2020−2021, we interviewed 25 Australian young people (Mage = 13.60, SD = 2.26, 20 females and 5 males) living with family members affected by mental illness to understand their (the young people's) experiences, and to identify the types of support that these young people considered important or effective. We conducted reflexive thematic analyses of interview data, underpinned by interpretivist assumptions. Results: We identified seven themes within two higher-order categories reflecting our aims to understand (1) lived experiences within families affected by mental illness (i.e., increased responsibilities, missing out, and stigmatization), and (2) support experiences, needs, and preferences (i.e., respite, shared experiences with like-minded others, education, and flexibility). Conclusions: Our findings hold substantial practical value by informing services, interventions, and conversations that better support young people living in families affected by mental illness