Exploring Intergenerational Value Changes across Three Generations of Emirati Women Using Focused Ethnography

Intergenerational value change, influenced by technological advancements, economic development, formal education, and urbanization, becomes especially complex when it occurs in times of rapid changes, as in the case of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Through the lens of social change and human development theory, heavily constructed in the Gemeinschaft/Gesellschaft paradigm, this focused ethnography explored the push and pull of traditional boundaries within a collectivist society and the necessary navigation of infused Westernized philosophies promoting individualism and autonomy. Participants in this study (N = 24) were members of 8 family triads of grandmothers, mothers, and daughters who represented 8 different Emirati tribes from 4 cities in the Emirates. Data were collected during semi-structured interviews using prompts and vignettes and through observation and the generation of field notes. Thematic analysis revealed 3 themes that described the Emirati women’s unique cultural experiences: (a) cultural value change (gender equity and roles, family connectedness and relatedness) is evident across generations; (b) change in cultural values is the result of multiple factors (e.g., wealth, education, heterogeneity, independence, need for and acceptance of change, negotiation); and (c) resistance to change (e.g., gender roles, respect, connectedness, relatedness) slows the changing of values. The findings underscore the need to support young Emirati women as they navigate value change and try to rectify often conflicting role expectations. Insight gained from this study informs the field of cross-cultural leadership and female leadership development in the Gulf region

Sustainability reporting in the United Arab Emirates : institutional insights

This thesis attempts to answer the following research question: “What social and institutional factors impact on the current state of affairs concerning the disclosure of social and environmental reporting of listed companies in the UAE and how do they affect the potential for change?” A social constructionist viewpoint is held throughout. The research question is attempted to be answered by using Neo-Institutional Theory as a theoretical lens, including the role of organisational fields as well as Institutional Entrepreneurs. The research is broken down into three phases. The first phase looks at analysing all annual reports and sustainability reports of listed companies in the UAE. The research finds that only 26 out of 148 made any Sustainability Reporting (SR) disclosure, and very few produced qualitatively good reports. The second phase consists of 33 semi-structured in-depth interviews with 22 individuals from 21 organisations. Phase 3 is an in-depth organisational study of a mini organisational field, focusing on one of the most successful organisations in SR from the original sample of 148, as well as an interdependent network organisation. Phase 2 and 3 reveal that there are a complex number of issues currently hindering institutionalisation of SR to occur. However, there are some positive elements that could aid change in future. The research finds the following: The level of SR in the UAE is generally low, as might be expected based on previous research. There are, however, exceptions where companies actively promote sustainability and SR. The cultural context plays a more important role than generally recognised; small organisational fields (‘mini-fields’) play an important role in successful implementation of SR; Institutional Entrepreneurs are important; their success relies on their personal approach including commitment and resilience. For the Institutional Entrepreneur to succeed it is helpful to have a network of like-minded individuals inside and outside the organisation to connect with. The findings also suggest that influence regarding institutionalisation emanates from and towards the organisational context. Connections and interdependence play a critical role; there is evidence that change happens at a more subtle level than previously recognised

ANTECEDENTS AND CONSEQUENCES OF INTERNAL BRANDING: THE CASE OF ABU DHABI DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

Internal branding is a new marketing paradigm to gain effective brand strategy that has recently emerged in the academic literature of marketing. It is a brand spirit that brings together brand loyalty, management and employees to their mutual benefit to create and deliver a value-added product or service to employees, customers and stakeholders (Keller, 1993). {Keller, 1993 #59}Generally, studies on the role of internal branding in creating a competitive organisational culture by considering antecedents that enable internal branding and its consequences do not exist within the UAE context. This study aims to show the importance of internal branding, and to develop and test a conceptual model that integrates specific constructs as antecedents and consequences of internal branding, these are external customer orientation, internal customer orientation, interdepartmental connectedness, quality of internal services, external customer satisfaction, and job satisfaction. The study takes on a quantitative approach a positivist enquiry, i.e., the primary research is in the form of a survey questionnaire and the secondary research is drawn from the literature. The questionnaire was designed and distributed amongst a selected sample of 300 employees from cross-functional sections in Abu Dhabi Department of Economic Development, where they were asked to test the suggested model. The findings identified four factors as the antecedents plus two factors as the consequences of internal branding. The study proposes an empirically tested integrated model of the antecedents and consequences of internal branding that will enable organisations to implement internal branding leading to business success. The developed conceptual model could contribute superior value to the Departments of the Abu Dhabi Government in general, and to the Abu Dhabi Department of Economic Development to contributing a practical business solution, particularly to its success. This study is the first to propose a model that integrates the antecedents and consequence of internal branding in a government setting in the UAE. The outcomes and findings of this study will, as it is hoped, to enrich the internal branding concept and literature, along with extensively extending insightful knowledge beyond the Western schools of thought to the UAE

The Impact of Social Media on Improving English Learning Skills: A Case Study of UAE

Social media are one of the current forms of media that have diverse qualities and characteristics. Today, the use of social media is growing day by day at a significant rate. It is in this domain that students can virtually meet with their classmates and their teachers. They can communicate issues that are of significance and are related to their learning process. This study aimed to explore how social media platforms could affect English learning skills and to find whether social media could improve English language skills. The current study used mixed methods involving quantitative and qualitative approaches, such as interviews, questionnaires, as well as an experimental research method, which was employed in the current study. Pre-test and post-test were applied for examining the students‟ performance before and after the experiment to examine the influence of social media platforms used on improving the students writing and speaking skills. Evidence from the three instruments, questionnaire, interview, and the quasi-experiment (pre-post-test) showed how social media platforms influence the students\u27 English learning skills. Conclusively, the use of social media platforms contributes to the improvement of students‟ skills and increases their motivation when writing recount texts. Therefore, this study suggests that social media should be incorporated into the UAE pedagogical system to improve the reading and speaking skills of the students significantly. It is thus logical to find that social networking sites (SNS) can be an excellent platform for teaching and learning of the English language. Especially for developing English reading and writing, students can utilize the (SNS) regularly

Moderating Role of Attention Control in the Relationship Between Academic Distraction and Performance

Objectives: The purpose of this study is to examine the influence of social media engagement, which includes frequency of using social media platforms (FSMP) and social media involvement, on the academic distraction and academic performance of the student. The study further tests the moderating role of attention control on the relationship between academic distraction and academic performance. Method: Data were collected from 272 students studying in universities in India. Students answered questions on the frequency of visiting social media platforms and social media involvement, components of academic distraction, and attention control. AMOS software was used to test the structural model. Results: FSMP does not contribute to academic distraction; however, consistent social media involvement does predict academic distraction. Unlike previous studies, academic distraction does not influence the academic performance of students born in the digital era, who have accessed social media throughout their childhood. Attention control moderates the relationship between academic distraction and academic performance. Conclusions: The study challenges past research that claims social media engagement has a negative effect on student academic performance. Social media involvement, such as texting, commenting, and sharing updates, causes academic distraction but may not affect student academic performance. A novel finding is that the strength and direction of the relationship between academic distraction on academic performance vary with attention control. Implication for Theory and/or Practice: The study can be useful for educators and policy makers to build strategies for developing digital citizenship behaviours among students and thereby leverage social media for improved academic achievements of students. In particular, the potential moderating role of attention control in the interaction between academic distraction and academic performance has implications for educators and researchers

User Participation in Software Design via Social Media: Experiences from a Case Study with Consumers

User participation has proved to have many benefits in software development. The traditional methods for participation rely mainly on face-to-face meetings and are therefore not easily applicable to designing online services targeted at distributed consumers. Social media have become widely used among consumers and could thus offer many opportunities for involving users in software design. We present a case study in which a group of users participated for over six months in the process of designing a new online service via social media tools. The users played an active role in the development of the system, tailoring it to their own needs. Our results show that social media provide real possibilities for user involvement in software design and also shape some elements of the participation process. In social media, user contributions are mainly small and dispersed over time, but users can be involved almost continuously in the design process, thus enabling them to have a more active role in decision-making. Software development practices need to be modified so that small user contributions fit into the process

Determinants that impact first year male students’ motivation to learn at UAE public colleges

UAE male undergraduate dropout is a bleed into the country’s human resources in its strategic quest to enter the digital economy with a well-educated local generation in a post oil-era. The phenomenon is more apparent in first year students studying foundation courses of English to be prepared to enter college. As students enter the learning environment of higher education institutes, they move from teacher-centric education to learner-centric education, from a predominantly Arab culture of high school, to a predominantly Western environment of colleges where challenges of adaptability arise. In these socially and academically changing education communities, students are expected to assume personal responsibilities in a learner-centric environment utilising different teaching methods and aiding technologies than what they were used to at high school. Inabilities to adapt to this environment have challenging effects on students’ motivation leading to unsatisfactory academic results and even dropouts. This qualitative descriptive research was conducted using 13 focus groups of first year undergraduate UAE males in the three public UAE colleges of United Arab Emirates University (UAEU), Zayed University (ZU), and Higher Colleges of Technology (HCT). The aim was to understand student perception of their social and education environment and its elements that affect their motivation to learn. The results show that social, curriculum, personal and college related elements play important roles on students’ motivation and engagement in learning. A theoretical contribution of the study is that it adds evidence that focus groups can be used as a self-contained research method. A practical contribution of the research is that it presented a detailed account of elements that have positive and negative impact on motivation, and the suggested remedies for higher education policy makers, administrators and instructors to implement and improve student retention. A side contribution of the research was the uncovering of elements that relate directly to both students’ class failure and dropout

The impact of political connectedness on corporate governance disclosure : empirical evidence from Pakistan

This research examines how political connectedness influences the corporate governance disclosure practices of listed companies. The research also explores the process of preparation of annual reports and seeks explanations on decision making, regarding the level and nature of corporate governance disclosure. This research uses annual report data from companies listed on the Karachi Stock Exchange from 2009-2013. The research utilises qualitative content analysis for the study of the disclosure practices of politically connected and non-connected firms. An in-depth analysis of silence has been conducted focusing on the incidence of the lack of information on corporate governance. Furthermore, semi-structured interviews have been conducted in order to seek deeper insights into the research phenomena and the triangulation of findings. The findings of the qualitative content analysis indicate that non-connected firms disclose a higher level of voluntary, as well as mandatory corporate governance information, in comparison with politically connected firms. However, the variation in the level of voluntary disclosure is found to be higher when compared with mandatory disclosure. The results of the analysis of silence indicate that politically connected firms stay silent on a diverse range of voluntary disclosure items and provide notably limited disclosure. The findings of interview data analysis are consistent with the findings of qualitative content analysis and the analysis of silence in annual reports. To make sense of the findings the research has called upon the dual perspectives offered by agency theory and rational choice institutionalism. In assessing the implications of disclosure/non-disclosure practices it is found that the decision to disclose information is driven by the self-interest and opportunism of politically connected members of the board who avoid voluntary disclosure of information. However, it is also found that rationality plays an important role and while the firms are operating in a tight regulatory environment, politically connected firms provide better mandatory disclosure

Changes in Learning Environment and Students’ Attitudes and Anxiety Associated with the Transition from Primary to Secondary School Mathematics

This study involving 541 South Australian mathematics students utilised scales adapted from the What Is Happening In this Class? Test of Mathematics Related Attitudes and Revised Mathematics Anxiety Rating Scale to identify changes across the transition from primary to secondary school in terms of the classroom learning environment and students’ attitude and anxiety towards mathematics. Secondary students perceived less involvement, less-positive attitudes to mathematical inquiry, less enjoyment of mathematics and greater mathematics anxiety

City indicators : now to Nanjing

This paper provides the key elements to develop an integrated approach for measuring and monitoring city performance globally. The paper reviews the role of cities and why indicators are important. Then it discusses past approaches to city indicators and the systems developed to date, including the World Bank's initiatives. After identifying the strengths and weaknesses of past experiences, it discusses the characteristics of optimal indicators. The paper concludes with a proposed plan to develop standardized indicators that emphasize the importance of indicators that are measurable, replicable, potentially predictive, and most important, consistent and comparable over time and across cities. As an innovative characteristic, the paper includes subjective measures in city indicators, such as well-being, happy citizens, and trust.Cultural Policy,City Development Strategies,Cultural Heritage&Preservation,ICT Policy and Strategies,Housing&Human Habitats