Proceedings of the ANDROID Doctoral School in Disaster Resilience 2014

The ANDROID Doctoral School is a core element of the ANDROID disaster resilience network with a mandate to strengthen the link between research and teaching in the area of disaster resilience. The interdisciplinary mixed teaching space that we have developed as part of this ongoing project encouraged and promoted the work of doctoral students in this field. Furthermore, the doctoral school provided an opportunity for the development of a supportive interdisciplinary community of researchers in the area of disaster resilience. The ANDROID disaster resilience network doctoral school consists of two programmes: 1. Online Doctoral School (ODS) and 2. Residential Doctoral School (RDS) The interlinked programmes work together to deliver on a number of teaching and research driven objectives. The Online Doctoral School, conducted in Spring 2014, provided an innovative platform for developing an interdisciplinary knowledge base for the doctoral candidates. A total of 44 doctoral candidates representing 27 countries participated in the two day online programme. The school offered a series of live presentations by domain experts in disaster resilience around the world, an opportunity for discussions between experts and students and thematic sessions aimed at engaging the students in knowledge discovery and identification of shared problems and issues through detailed discussions fully exploiting the state of the art facilities in online programme delivery. The Residential Doctoral School programme (2014) was used as an opportunity to build on the outcomes of the Online Doctoral School by actively engaging doctoral student work through presentations, domain expert feedback and intensive discussion during the annual meeting of the Android Disaster Resilience Network. All participating students developed and submitted an original research piece (based on their doctoral studies) that was peer reviewed by experts within the field. The RDS process includes a limited number of scholarship awards to attend a three day event which entails a panel review of the work of the students and dissemination of this work to a wider audience. A total of 26 papers double peer reviewed and edited through the doctoral school team were presented at the RDS 2014. All presenters were successful participants of the online doctoral school, ODS 2014 held in March 2014. The residential portion of the school was held from the 8th to the 10th of September, 2014 in the MediaCityUK, Salford Quays in Manchester runs in parallel with the 4th International Conference on Building Resilience which incorporates the 3rd Annual Meeting of the Android Disaster Resilience Network. The conference event itself has been jointly organised by the Centre for Disaster Resilience, University of Salford and the ANDROID Disaster Resilience Network, in association with the United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR) Making Cities Resilient: ‘My City is getting ready!’ campaign. This volume presents concise summaries of the contributions of all the doctoral papers presented at the RDS (2014), produced and developed by doctoral students with the guidance, direction and suggestions of a group of experts led by the ANDROID Doctoral School team. These papers demonstrate the richness, diversity and interdisciplinary nature of research topics and problems being tackled by disaster resilience researchers. Furthermore, we see here examples of discovery and expansion of research themes that go beyond disciplinary boundaries, reflecting on the greater context of disaster resilience. The work of the doctoral researchers presented here is a valuable contribution to the body of knowledge which, given the growing vulnerability and exposure to disasters of human and natural origin, depends on the development of greater interdisciplinary expertise among the scholars of the future. Further information on the ANDROID Doctoral School can be found at: http://www.disaster-resilience.net/index.php/doctoral-school-2014

Understanding Students' and Teachers' Approaches to Tablet Use in Turkish Secondary Schools: A Model Based Approach

Rapidly developing and widely used mobile technologies have been changing the way we live and learn. Such devices were banned from schools not long ago, and now, they are becoming part of everyday practice in schools. Governments around the world have been increasingly investing in learning technologies with the belief that teachers and students will eventually benefit from them (Diemer, Fernandez & Streepay, 2012; Pedró, 2010). However, these investments do not always result as desired. Turkey, where this research took place, is one of the countries that has invested in ICT through a program called the “Movement of Enhancing Opportunities and Improving Technology”, known as the FATIH Project. With the Fatih project the government had aimed to revolutionise the education by ‘upgrading’ the classrooms with the latest technology smartboards and providing students and teachers with a personal tablet. It is one of the most expensive and extensive government supported ICT projects ever taken place (Tamim, Borokhovski, Pickup & Bernard, 2015), and it is important to understand the perceptions of the end users. In order to collect information on students’ and teachers’ attitudes towards tablets a qualitative study with teacher interviews, student focus group sessions and observations was conducted. Moreover, lately ‘technology acceptance models’ have taken their places in education research with the claim that they could help to foresee the acceptance behaviour before developing or introducing a new technology by providing measurable variables; therefore, avoiding unexpected user rejection (Jan & Contreras, 2011). In this regard, this research aims to test the applicability of an existing model the ‘Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology 2’ (UTAUT2), which has been commonly used by educational researchers, and is suggested to be more suitable to educational account. In that sense, this part of the research has a quantitative nature. Data were collected through questionnaires from secondary school students (n=266) and analysed in accordance with the qualitative data collected with this research and the previous literature. It is believed that theoretical findings of this research will help researchers to understand if a model approach is suitable for education, if so, will help to develop a model that corresponds to the requirements of educational research. Additionally, the findings of this study will help the Turkish government in understanding the expectations and perceptions of the students and teachers regarding the tablet use in education

Consumer perceived benefits and value in apparel m-retail

Within the UK retail sector, fashion shopping via mobiles is one of the fastest developing forms of online retail, yet recent research has shown that apparel retailers have been slow to implement appropriate mobile platforms into overall marketing strategies, thereby failing to satisfy consumer expectations and missing opportunities emerging through this channel. This research analyses mobile apparel retail from the consumer’s perspective. The aim is to understand fashion shopping experiences via smartphones. Research questions relate to the benefits fashion consumers are seeking through mobile shopping channels, how consumers shop, why they use smartphones and what influences their decision-making process. Consequently, a theory of interactive relationship between m-retail and consumer purchase behaviour has been developed. A mixed methods approach was adopted guided by Grounded Theory methodology complemented by experimental work. It applied 200 questionnaires, 1,313 mobile app reviews, 23 eye tracking experiments involving websites, mobile apps and mobile websites, 6 focus group discussions and 8 case studies. A conceptual model of Essential Features of Mobile Channel (EFMC) was developed by triangulating data gathered from a range of sources: eye tracking experiments, mobile app reviews and focus groups. Case studies of commercial platforms, implementing 43 features of EFMC, were used to evaluate mobile websites and apps developed by apparel retailers. This research contributes to knowledge by developing a Benefits-Value Theory (BVT), which addresses the relationship between levels of benefits and their influence on shopping involvement, by examining the ways consumers perceive mobile platforms and respond with distinctive behaviours and attitudes. This conceptual framework devotes what companies are doing on mobile and what consumers think about it. BVT provides a base for fashion consumer segmentation. Consumer profiles have been developed to account for shifts in consumer behaviour led by mobile technologies. This research proposes a model for diagnosing the strengths and weaknesses of mobile platforms. Shopping journey and behaviour models establish how to segment the consumer base, capturing a complexity of their behaviours, by assigning value to fashion retail. This research helps apparel retailers to develop appropriate marketing strategies in m-retail focusing on maximizing customer benefits and satisfaction by fulfilling retailers’ value creation and delivery

Digital Finger Painting: A Qualitative Exploration of the Tablet Computer and its Artistic Implications in an Early Childhood Setting

The purpose of this study was to better understand the implications of the tablet computer for learning and, specifically, in the art classroom. A qualitative study was designed following grounded theory measures for data analysis in order to explore timely questions regarding the tablet computer and how young children react to such technology as a drawing tool. An early childhood center was accessed for this research, and 30 children between the ages of three and five years old consented to participate. Four educators and 35 parents were also enlisted in an effort to elicit substantive perspectives regarding the tablet and its artistic potential. Children were observed as they drew on an iPad® tablet and digital drawings created were compared to those made with crayons on paper. Additionally, collaborative art making with the tablet computer was encouraged, and children completed digital drawings in pairs. Semi-structured interviews shed light on what children enjoyed about the tablet computer as well as what they disliked about the technology. Parent and educator perceptions regarding the tablet computer as a learning and drawing tool were gathered through brief survey data and one-on-one interviews. Findings have been detailed through participants’ stories and documented thematically

INNOVATIVE DIGITAL START-UPS AND THEIR VENTURE CREATION PROCESS WITH ENABLING DIGITAL PLATFORMS

Start-ups have gained media attention since Google, Facebook and Amazon were launched in the 1990s. The book Lean Start-up, published in 2011, was another important milestone for digital start-up literature. As unicorn companies emerge around the world, topics highlighted in the news include the vast amount of capital that digital start-ups are raising, the ways in which these digital ventures are disrupting industries, and their global impact on digital economy. However, digital start-ups, digital venture ideas, and their venture creation process lack a unified venture creation model, as there is a gap in the re-search on entrepreneurial processes in a digital context. This research is an explorative study of the venture creation process of innovative digital start-ups that examines what is missing from entrepreneurial process models in a digital technology context and investi-gates how early stage digital start-ups conduct the venture creation process, starting with the pre-phase of antecedents and ending with the launch and scaling of the venture. The research proposes a novel process model of innovative digital start-up venture crea-tion and describes the nature and patterns of the process. A conceptual model was devel-oped based on the entrepreneurship, information systems, and digital innovation litera-ture and empirically assessed with a multi-method qualitative research design. The data collected from semi-structured interviews, internet sources, and observation field notes covered 34 innovative digital start-ups and their founders. Interviews were conducted in-ternationally in high-ranking start-up ecosystems, and the data were analysed with the-matic analysis and fact-checked by triangulating internet data sources. The contribution to entrepreneurship theory is a new illustrative model of the venture creation process of innovative digital start-ups, including the emergent outcome of the process having a digi-tal artefact at its core (e.g., mobile apps, web-based solutions, digital platforms, software solutions, and digital ecosystems). Digital platforms and their multiple roles in the process are presented, as well as the role of critical events as moderators of the process which trigger new development cycles. During the venture creation process, the recombining of digital technologies, modules, and components enabled by digital infrastructures, plat-forms, and ecosystem partners represent digital technology affordances. This recombina-tion provides opportunities for asset-free development of digital venture ideas

Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Technology in Mathematics Teaching ICTMT 12

Innovation, inclusion, sharing and diversity are some of the words that briefly and suitably characterize the ICTMT series of biennial international conferences – the International Conference on Technology in Mathematics Teaching. Being the twelfth of a series which began in Birmingham, UK, in 1993, under the influential enterprise of Professor Bert Waits from Ohio State University, this conference was held in Portugal for the first time. The 12th International Conference on Technology in Mathematics Teaching was hosted by the Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the University of Algarve, in the city of Faro, from 24 to 27 June 2015, and was guided by the original spirit of its foundation. The integration of digital technologies in mathematics education across school levels and countries, from primary to tertiary education, together with the understanding of the phenomena involved in the teaching and learning of mathematics in technological environments have always been driving forces in the transformation of pedagogical practices. The possibility of joining at an international conference a wide diversity of participants, including school mathematics teachers, lecturers, mathematicians, mathematics educators and researchers, software designers, and curriculum developers, is one facet that makes this conference rather unique. At the same time, it seeks to foster the sharing of ideas, experiences, projects and studies while providing opportunities to try-out and assess tools or didactical proposals during times of hands-on work. The ICTMT 12 had this same ambition, when embracing and welcoming just over 120 delegates who actively and enthusiastically contributed to a very packed program of scientific proposals and sessions on various topics

Communicating in a Multi-Role, Multi- Device, Multi-Channel World: How Knowledge Workers Manage Work- Home Boundaries

Technology keeps us connected through multiple devices, on several communication channels, and with our many daily roles. Being able to better manage one’s availability and thus have more control over work-home boundaries can potentially reduce interferences and ultimately stress. However, little is known about the practical implications of communication technologies and their role in boundary and availability management. Taking a bottom-up approach, we conducted four exploratory qualitative studies to understand how current communication technologies support and challenge work-home boundaries for knowledge workers. First, we compared email practices across accounts and devices, finding differences based on professional and personal preferences. Secondly, with wearables such as smartwatches becoming more popular, findings from our autoethnography and interview study show how device ecologies can be used to moderate notifications and one’s sense of availability. Thirdly, moving beyond just email to include multiple communication channels, our diary study and focus group showed how awareness and availability are managed and interpreted differently between senders and receivers. Together, these studies portray how current communication technologies challenge boundary management and how users rely on strategies – that we define as microboundaries – to mitigate boundary cross-overs, boundary interruptions, and expectations of availability. Finally, to understand the extent to which microboundaries can be useful boundary management strategies, we took a multiple-case study approach to evaluate how they are used over time and found that, although context-dependent, microboundaries help increase participants’ boundary control and reduce stress. This thesis’ primary contribution is a taxonomy of microboundary strategies that deepens our current understanding of boundary management in the digital age. By feeling in control, users experience fewer unwanted boundary cross-overs and ultimately feel less stressed. This work leads to our secondary contribution to individual and organisational practice. Finally, we draw a set of implications for the design of interactions and cross-device experiences

Perceptible affordances and feedforward for gestural interfaces: Assessing effectiveness of gesture acquisition with unfamiliar interactions

The move towards touch-based interfaces disrupts the established ways in which users manipulate and control graphical user interfaces. The predominant mode of interaction established by the desktop interface is to ‘double-click’ an icon in order to open an application, file or folder. Icons show users where to click and their shape, colour and graphic style suggests how they respond to user action. In sharp contrast, in a touch-based interface, an action may require a user to form a gesture with a certain number of fingers, a particular movement, and in a specific place. Often, none of this is suggested in the interface. This thesis adopts the approach of research through design to address the problem of how to inform the user about which gestures are available in a given touch-based interface, how to perform each gesture, and, finally, the effect of each gesture on the underlying system. Its hypothesis is that presenting automatic and animated visual prompts that depict touch and preview gesture execution will mitigate the problems users encounter when they execute commands within unfamiliar gestural interfaces. Moreover, the thesis claims the need for a new framework to assess the efficiency of gestural UI designs. A significant aspect of this new framework is a rating system that was used to assess distinct phases within the users’ evaluation and execution of a gesture. In order to support the thesis hypothesis, two empirical studies were conducted. The first introduces the visual prompts in support of training participants in unfamiliar gestures and gauges participants’ interpretation of their meaning. The second study consolidates the design features that yielded fewer error rates in the first study and assesses different interaction techniques, such as the moment to display the visual prompt. Both studies demonstrate the benefits in providing visual prompts to improve user awareness of available gestures. In addition, both studies confirm the efficiency of the rating system in identifying the most common problems users have with gestures and identifying possible design features to mitigate such problems. The thesis contributes: 1) a gesture-and-effect model and a corresponding rating system that can be used to assess gestural user interfaces, 2) the identification of common problems users have with unfamiliar gestural interfaces and design recommendations to mitigate these problems, and 3) a novel design technique that will improve user awareness of unfamiliar gestures within novel gestural interfaces

Design revolutions: IASDR 2019 Conference Proceedings. Volume 1: Change, Voices, Open

In September 2019 Manchester School of Art at Manchester Metropolitan University was honoured to host the bi-annual conference of the International Association of Societies of Design Research (IASDR) under the unifying theme of DESIGN REVOLUTIONS. This was the first time the conference had been held in the UK. Through key research themes across nine conference tracks – Change, Learning, Living, Making, People, Technology, Thinking, Value and Voices – the conference opened up compelling, meaningful and radical dialogue of the role of design in addressing societal and organisational challenges. This Volume 1 includes papers from Change, Voices and Open tracks of the conference