20 research outputs found
Mitigating Negative Behaviors in Student Project Teams: An Information Technology Solution
The evolution of the information systems (IS) profession as well as the IS educational environment has resulted in student project teams becoming an increasingly important component of IS education. Negative behaviors within these project teams result in less than optimal project outcomes and confound attempts to fairly evaluate individual efforts within the team. These negative behaviors can also result in unfavorable perceptions of the educational experience for many students. An information technology-based application consisting of an online interactive activity log and an online peer review system was developed to mitigate the common negative behaviors of social loafing and free riding and provide more accurate and useful information for evaluation. Its successful implementation in a specific classroom environment is discussed and evidence of its efficacy is supplied in the form of subjective assessment by the instructors and the results of a survey measuring student perceptions of the system
The Effectiveness of Computer-Based Game Show Formats in Survey Courses: A Quasi-Experiment
The confluence of computers and integrated projection systems in the classroom has opened new avenues for course content delivery in an active learning format. This paper first discusses the concepts of active learning and play in a pedagogical context. Next, the implementation and subjective results of a generic computer-based game show for delivering course content in introductory survey courses is presented. This paper then describes the employed methodology and statistically tests certain aspects of the course related to the effectiveness of this implementation. The results of this quasi-experiment using five sections of an upper-division MIS (Management Information Systems) survey course spanning three academic terms strongly support the research hypotheses that the game show format increases student learning and improves student perceptions of the overall quality of the course. The implications of this research for educators are discussed. The game show application was developed by the authors and is available for download as freeware
Determinants of Perceived Usefulness and Perceived Ease of Use in Individual Adoption of Social Network Sites
A large-scale online survey (n=1327) was utilized to investigate determinants of perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use as well as other effects on the formation of a behavioral intention to use social network sites (SNS). Findings show that need-based motivations such as social deficit, communication need, and community need do positively impact perceived usefulness while hedonic need and contribution need do not. Additionally, perceived ease of use was affected by technologyoriented self-efficacy. Trust and privacy considerations impacted perceived usefulness as well, while external threats to security did not. Finally, age and gender effects on the underlying technology acceptance model constructs were also explored
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Results of the Level 1 probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) of internal events for heavy water production reactors
A full-scope probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) is being performed for the Savannah River site (SRS) production reactors. The Level 1 PRA for the K Reactor has been completed and includes the assessment of reactor systems response to accidents and estimates of the severe core melt frequency (SCMF). The internal events spectrum includes those events related directly to plant systems and safety functions for which transients or failures may initiate an accident. The SRS PRA has three principal objectives: improved understanding of SRS reactor safety issues through discovery and understanding of the mechanisms involved. Improved risk management capability through tools for assessing the safety impact of both current standard operations and proposed revisions. A quantitative measure of the risks posed by SRS reactor operation to employees and the general public, to allow comparison with declared goals and other societal risks
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The application of modern safety criteria to restarting and operating the USDOE K-Reactor
The United States Department of Energy's (USDOE's) K-reactor, a defense production reactor located at the Savannah River Site in Aiken, South Carolina, was shut down in the summer of 1988 for safety upgrades to bring it into conformance with modern safety standards prior to restart. Over the course of the succeeding four years, all aspects of the 35-year old reactor, including hardware, operations, and analysis, were upgraded to ensure that the reactor could operate safely according to standards similar to those applied to modern nuclear reactors. This paper describes the decision making processes by which issues were identified, priorities assigned, and analysis improved to enhance reactor safety. Special emphasis is given to the probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) decision making processes used to quantify the risks and consequences of operating the K-reactor, the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) used to identify key phenomena, and modifications made to the RELAP5 computer code to make it applicable to K-reactor analysis. The success of the project was demonstrated when the K-reactor was restarted in the summer of 1992