Apps and Autonomy: Perceived Interactivity and Autonomous Regulation in mHealth Applications

Thousands of smartphone apps geared toward monitoring health behaviors are released regularly. Even as developers flood the market with mHealth apps, consumers seem overwhelmed with choices and report lack of sustained use, which raises questions about their efficacy. An online survey (N = 513) found that perceived interactivity not only has a direct effect but also exerts an indirect effect via greater autonomous regulation on users’ attitudes and behavioral intentions toward mHealth apps. Frequency of tracking and updating personal data showed significant effects on behavioral intentions. Theoretical and practical suggestions for the design and evaluation of mHealth apps are discussed

An electronic service quality transactional model of attraction, trust and loyalty for interactive healthcare portal

Interactive Health Portals (IHPs) are portals of healthcare providers which offer e-services for patients to assist them in obtaining required health information, communicate easily and access all services offered. The quality of e-services provided by the IHP is a critical concern since it serves as a gateway to patients to interact with a respective healthcare provider. IHPs are well developed in US and Europe, but developing countries such as Malaysia are still lagging behind this trend. IHPs are very important for private hospitals whose aim include servicing patients from other countries. Previous studies have investigated how to attract patients, to increase their trust and to make them loyal to IHPs within developing countries, however they were studied in a segregate manner. The relationship among them have yet been explored in the context of healthcare and as a transaction model for patients’ loyalty on IHP is not studied yet. The aim of this study is to identify the e-service quality (e-SQ) factors that may influence attraction, trust and loyalty on IHP and thus propose an e-SQ transactional model of attraction, trust and loyalty for IHP. A survey method was employed to examine the influence of the identified e-SQ factors on three components of attraction, trust and loyalty in the proposed model. Questionnaires were distributed targeting patients at three private hospitals who had experience in using e-services in which two hundred and three patients responded to the survey. Collected data were analysed using the Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) technique. The results showed that e-SQ factors of usability, information quality, virtual training, IHP services, and cost savings positively influenced patients’ attraction. Trust of patients was positively influenced by security, privacy, reliability, and policy of IHPs. Finally, the e-SQ factors of compensation, responsiveness and hospitality affected patient loyalty in a positive manner. The Importance-Performance Matrix Analysis indicated that the top priority to be addressed to attract patients are IHP services and cost saving. Next, attraction, reliability and privacy are the most important factors to gain patients’ trust, while hospitality and trust are most significant to make patients loyal. The e-SQ transactional model as an outcome of this study is hoped to assist Malaysian IHP providers to better understand patients’ demands and allow them to design more patient-centric portals. This study is especially beneficial to private hospitals which receive no governmental financial aids and are in close competition with other private hospitals

CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY IN ROMANIA

The purpose of this paper is to identify the main opportunities and limitations of corporate social responsibility (CSR). The survey was defined with the aim to involve the highest possible number of relevant CSR topics and give the issue a more wholesome perspective. It provides a basis for further comprehension and deeper analyses of specific CSR areas. The conditions determining the success of CSR in Romania have been defined in the paper on the basis of the previously cumulative knowledge as well as the results of various researches. This paper provides knowledge which may be useful in the programs promoting CSR.Corporate social responsibility, Supportive policies, Romania

Shut Up and Take My Money: Engaging Facebook Communities to Build the Brand Narrative

Social media is revolutionizing the way firms manage their brands. A broad variety of platforms provide businesses an opportunity to engage in bidirectional dialogue with their customers, the effect of which is to enhance the brand/consumer relationship. This paper contends that virtual brand communities of the type that form through social media have an important role to play in the development of a brand’s personality. Using a case study approach we demonstrate how one firm has adopted Facebook to provide their brand community with a voice which contributes to the development of the brand narrative. We find that by using well-crafted content the firm elicits the support of their community and that this interaction contributes to the development of the brand ethos

Applications of Virtual Reality

Information Technology is growing rapidly. With the birth of high-resolution graphics, high-speed computing and user interaction devices Virtual Reality has emerged as a major new technology in the mid 90es, last century. Virtual Reality technology is currently used in a broad range of applications. The best known are games, movies, simulations, therapy. From a manufacturing standpoint, there are some attractive applications including training, education, collaborative work and learning. This book provides an up-to-date discussion of the current research in Virtual Reality and its applications. It describes the current Virtual Reality state-of-the-art and points out many areas where there is still work to be done. We have chosen certain areas to cover in this book, which we believe will have potential significant impact on Virtual Reality and its applications. This book provides a definitive resource for wide variety of people including academicians, designers, developers, educators, engineers, practitioners, researchers, and graduate students

Semantic discovery and reuse of business process patterns

Patterns currently play an important role in modern information systems (IS) development and their use has mainly been restricted to the design and implementation phases of the development lifecycle. Given the increasing significance of business modelling in IS development, patterns have the potential of providing a viable solution for promoting reusability of recurrent generalized models in the very early stages of development. As a statement of research-in-progress this paper focuses on business process patterns and proposes an initial methodological framework for the discovery and reuse of business process patterns within the IS development lifecycle. The framework borrows ideas from the domain engineering literature and proposes the use of semantics to drive both the discovery of patterns as well as their reuse

The appraisal of Facebook online community: An exposition of mobile commerce in social media reviews

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