Procedures and Methods for Cross-community Online Deliberation

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Cyril Velikanov

2010-09-01

Full Text Available In this paper we introduce our model of self-regulated mass online deliberation, and apply it to a context of cross-border deliberation involving translation of contributions between participating languages, and then to a context of cross-community online deliberation for dispute resolution, e.g. between opposing ethnic or religious communities. In such a cross-border or cross-community context, online deliberation should preferably progress as a sequence of segmented phases each followed by a combining phase. In a segmented phase, each community deliberates separately, and selects their best contributions for being presented to all other communities. Selection is made by using our proposed mechanism of mutual moderation and appraisal of contributions by participants themselves. In the subsequent combining phase, the selected contributions are translated (by volunteering or randomly selected participants among those who have specified appropriate language skills and presented to target segments for further appraisal and commenting. Our arguments in support of the proposed mutual moderation and appraisal procedures remain mostly speculative, as the whole subject of mass online self-regulatory deliberation still remains largely unexplored, and there exist no practical realisation of it .

Online Education in the Community College

Science.gov (United States)

Johnson, Steven G.; Berge, Zane

2012-01-01

This paper looks at three areas impacting online education at the community college level. Community colleges account for more than half of all online students in the United States as of 2006. This makes the success of online learning at the community college level a critical part of the growing online learning movement. Using data for…

Collaborative distance learning: Developing an online learning community

Science.gov (United States)

Stoytcheva, Maria

2017-12-01

The method of collaborative distance learning has been applied for years in a number of distance learning courses, but they are relatively few in foreign language learning. The context of this research is a hybrid distance learning of French for specific purposes, delivered through the platform UNIV-RcT (Strasbourg University), which combines collaborative activities for the realization of a common problem-solving task online. The study focuses on a couple of aspects: on-line interactions carried out in small, tutored groups and the process of community building online. By analyzing the learner's perceptions of community and collaborative learning, we have tried to understand the process of building and maintenance of online learning community and to see to what extent the collaborative distance learning contribute to the development of the competence expectations at the end of the course. The analysis of the results allows us to distinguish the advantages and limitations of this type of e-learning and thus evaluate their pertinence.

Online written consultation, telephone consultation and offline appointment: An examination of the channel effect in online health communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Wu, Hong; Lu, Naiji

2017-11-01

The emergence of online health communities broadens and diversifies channels for patient-doctor interaction. Given limited medical resources, online health communities aim to provide better treatment by decreasing medical costs, making full use of available resources and providing more diverse channels for patients. This research examines how online channel usage affects offline channels, i.e., "Online Booking, Service in Hospitals" (OBSH), and how the channel effects change with doctors' online and offline reputation. The study uses data of 4254 doctors from a Chinese online health community. Our findings demonstrate a strong relationship between online health communities and offline hospital communication with an important moderating role for reputation. There are significant channel effects, wherein written consultation complements OBSH (β=3.320, ponline and offline reputations can attract more patients to use the OBSH (β online =0.433, ponline and offline reputations: doctors with higher online reputations mitigate substitution effects between telephone consultation and OBSH (β=0.064, ponline services, especially for these physicians who do not have enough patients. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Women in Science and Engineering Building Community Online

Science.gov (United States)

Kleinman, Sharon S.

This article explores the constructs of online community and online social support and discusses a naturalistic case study of a public, unmoderated, online discussion group dedicated to issues of interest to women in science and engineering. The benefits of affiliation with OURNET (a pseudonym) were explored through participant observation over a 4-year period, telephone interviews with 21 subscribers, and content analysis of e-mail messages posted to the discussion group during a 125-day period. The case study findings indicated that through affiliation with the online discussion group, women in traditionally male-dominated fields expanded their professional networks, increased their knowledge, constituted and validated positive social identities, bolstered their self-confidence, obtained social support and information from people with a wide range of experiences and areas of expertise, and, most significantly, found community.

Hosting an eConference: Interactive video conference grand rounds between two institutions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jeffrey Rixe

2018-01-01

Full Text Available Audience: The eConference is an interactive video conference grand rounds innovation to augment the didactic curriculum provided for medical students, interns, residents, fellows, and attending physicians. Introduction: Formal education during emergency medicine (EM training has historically emphasized aspects of humanism and constructivism; the former through self-directed reading in books and journals, the latter through the content and discussion during resident didactics.1 However, some studies suggest that the current generation of EM learners are increasingly using digital and internet technologies to connect with online peer networks, a phenomenon known as connectivism.2 As such, contemporary EM learners are increasingly utilizing social media and Free Open Access Medical Education (FOAM to supplement traditional learning resources. The eConference was developed to be an interactive, virtual grand rounds that marries the merits of constructivism with connectivism; a new format of EM didactics that goes beyond the “typical lecture” model to incorporate the changing landscape in technology and medical education by combining classroom teaching at multiple institutions alongside digital learning tools. This manuscript outlines how to plan and execute a joint video conference with another institution. Objectives: Our objectives were to create and implement a novel virtual conference format through the integration of social media tools which allows for interdisciplinary and multi-site participation to enhance EM resident education. We wish to outline the steps required to reproduce this innovative session and share lessons learned. Conclusion: We designed and executed a multi-centered, novel form of virtual conference into the EM residency curriculum at two participating institutions. The virtual conference took place during a routine conference day for both programs, an hour in duration. The format utilized a hybrid of live and virtual

Excessive Gambling and Online Gambling Communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Sirola, Anu; Kaakinen, Markus; Oksanen, Atte

2018-04-05

The Internet provides an accessible context for online gambling and gambling-related online communities, such as discussion forums for gamblers. These communities may be particularly attractive to young gamblers who are active Internet users. The aim of this study was to examine the use of gambling-related online communities and their relevance to excessive gambling among 15-25-year-old Finnish Internet users (N = 1200). Excessive gambling was assessed by using the South Oaks Gambling Screen. Respondents were asked in a survey about their use of various kinds of gambling-related online communities, and sociodemographic and behavioral factors were adjusted. The results of the study revealed that over half (54.33%) of respondents who had visited gambling-related online communities were either at-risk gamblers or probable pathological gamblers. Discussion in these communities was mainly based on sharing gambling tips and experiences, and very few respondents said that they related to gambling problems and recovery. In three different regression models, visiting gambling-related online communities was a significant predictor for excessive gambling (with 95% confidence level) even after adjusting confounding factors. The association of visiting such sites was even stronger among probable pathological gamblers than among at-risk gamblers. Health professionals working with young people should be aware of the role of online communities in terms of development and persistence of excessive gambling. Monitoring the use of online gambling communities as well as utilizing recovery-oriented support both offline and online would be important in preventing further problems. Gambling platforms should also include warnings about excessive gambling and provide links to helpful sources.

Can Online Forums Be Designed to Empower Local Communities?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kerill Dunne

2011-07-01

Full Text Available There has been a growing concern regarding political disengagement among citizens within western representative democracies. This concern has brought about calls for local communities to be empowered by giving citizens more control over local decision making. The objective of this paper is to examine if local political online forums can be built to empower local communities. That is to say, this paper will test if the E-Democracy.org’s Local Issues Forum Guidebook recommendations (A to do list for building successful online forums actually work and produce forums which facilitate citizens to have a greater say on local decision making and thus, induce empowerment. In order to test these recommendations a two-pronged methodological approach was taken. Firstly, using these recommendations an online forum was constructed in-conjunction with a local authority within the UK. Secondly, the recommendations were tested again except in this second approach a sample of online forums from around the world was examined. This paper argues that the E-Democracy.org’s recommendations do not always produce forums which empower local communities - Based on lessons learned from both experiments new guidelines are provided.

Online Community Interaction - Revolution or Revulsion?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Justin Thorne

2008-02-01

Full Text Available Marketing writers' assertion that online communities are the future for organisations may be misguided, although peer-to-peer networks are certainly the future for consumers. Brands have experienced 'consumer revulsion' at their poorly-planned attempts to enter online communities to interact with customers. The Internet has facilitated a revolution amongst consumers, providing a medium for online communities to thrive. Source credibility is paramount and Internet users are being selective with exactly whose message they are willing to accept, absorb and ultimately, allow to influence their buying decisions. The primary objective of this research is to undertake an exploratory investigation into the dynamics of online communities and how membership influences the buying decision for consumers of genre novels. Through the process of online focus groups and the completion of online questionnaires, data on the dynamics of online relationships between consumers and authors, the buying habits of consumers and the acceptance of online word-of-mouth (WOM were extracted and analysed. This research demonstrates that the dynamics of online communities are highly complex and in no way inferior or less fulfilling than real-life relationships and that the influence of online relationships on our buying decisions have no less impact than real-life encounters.

17th Online World Conference on Soft Computing in Industrial Applications

CERN Document Server

Krömer, Pavel; Köppen, Mario; Schaefer, Gerald

2014-01-01

This volume of Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing contains accepted papers presented at WSC17, the 17th Online World Conference on Soft Computing in Industrial Applications, held from December 2012 to January 2013 on the Internet. WSC17 continues a successful series of scientific events started over a decade ago by the World Federation of Soft Computing. It brought together researchers from over the world interested in the ever advancing state of the art in the field. Continuous technological improvements make this online forum a viable gathering format for a world class conference. The aim of WSC17 was to disseminate excellent research results and contribute to building a global network of scientists interested in both theoretical foundations and practical applications of soft computing.   The 2012 edition of the Online World Conference on Soft Computing in Industrial Applications consisted of general track and special session on Continuous Features Discretization for Anomaly Intrusion Detectors...

Online professional development conferences: An effective, economical and eco-friendly option

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lynn Anderson

2010-05-01

Full Text Available In order to stay current within their field, many professionals regularly attend conferences and training events in distant locales. Travel to these conferences costs professionals, and their sponsor organizations, both time and money. In the past the benefits afforded by these conferences, and the lack of comparable alternatives, have provided justification for these expenditures. However, recent studies have shown that the cost of travel extends beyond the pocketbook. Transportation is a major contributor of carbon dioxide (CO2 emissions, a key suspect in the argument for the negative impact of global climate change. This paper examines the potential effects of travel to these conferences on the environment and promotes online conferences as a comparable alternative to face-to-face events. A successful online conference is used to demonstrate the magnitude of the environmental and economical benefits of online conferences. The authors posit that online conferencing technologies have evolved such that they now offer another option for professional development that is effective, economical and environmentally friendly. Résumé : Afin de rester à jour dans leur domaine, de nombreux professionnels participent régulièrement à des colloques et à des activités de formation dans des endroits éloignés. Se déplacer pour assister à de tels congrès ou colloques demande des investissements à la fois en temps et en argent de la part des professionnels et de leurs établissements parrains. Si, par le passé, les bénéfices que procuraient ces colloques et l’absence de solutions de rechange comparables justifiaient de telles dépenses, des études récentes ont toutefois montré que les frais de déplacement s’étendent au-delà des coûts financiers. Les transports constituent une source majeure des émissions de dioxyde de carbone (CO2, un composé soupçonné d’être l’un des facteurs clés de l’impact négatif de l’humain sur le

Towards a Conceptualization of Online Community Health

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Wagner, David; Richter, Alexander; Trier, Matthias

2014-01-01

Along with the increasing popularity of social media and online communities in many business settings, the notion of online community health has become a common means by which community managers judge the condition or state of their communities. It has also been introduced to the literature, yet...... the concept remains underspecified and fragmented. In this paper, we work toward a construct conceptualization of online community health. Through a review of extant literature and dialogue with specialists in the field, we develop a multi-dimensional construct of online community health, consisting of seven...... elements. In writing this paper, we attempt to foster theory development around new organizational forms by advancing a new and important construct. The paper further provides guidance to the managers of social media and online communities by taking a systematic look at the well-being of their communities....

The Online Learning Knowledge Garden: A Pedagogic Planning Tool for e-Learning

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Scott, Bernard

2006-01-01

Please, cite this publication as: Scott, B. (2006). The Online Learning Knowledge Garden: A Pedagogic Planning Tool for e-Learning. Proceedings of International Workshop in Learning Networks for Lifelong Competence Development, TENCompetence Conference. March 30th-31st, Sofia, Bulgaria:

Trust Discovery in Online Communities

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Piorkowski, John

2014-01-01

This research aims to discover interpersonal trust in online communities. Two novel trust models are built to explain interpersonal trust in online communities drawing theories and models from multiple relevant areas, including organizational trust models, trust in virtual settings, speech act theory, identity theory, and common bond theory. In…

Online Education in Community Colleges

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Cejda, Brent

2010-01-01

This chapter explores the tremendous growth in the use of the Internet to deliver distance education at community colleges. The author examines various definitions of online education, including the types of courses, programs, and degrees available and the types of community colleges that offer greater amounts of online programming. Considerations…

Online Communities

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sørensen, Henrik; Lassen, Astrid Heidemann; Gorm Hansen, Katrine

”Online Communities” er et medie for brugere og fagfolk, hvor de kan mødes digitalt for at dele erfaringer, og dette kan anvendes som inspiration indenfor Brugerdreven Innovation. Via ”desk research” kan virksomheder opnå adgang til varierende mængder af brugere på en forholdsvist enkelt måde. I...... denne rapport beskrives eksperimentets opbygning, resultater og mulige værdi. Vi håber hermed på at kunne give praktisk indsigt i, hvorledes virksomheder fra byggematerialeindustrien kan agere i online communities....

Attitudes Toward e-Mental Health Services in a Community Sample of Adults: Online Survey.

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March, Sonja; Day, Jamin; Ritchie, Gabrielle; Rowe, Arlen; Gough, Jeffrey; Hall, Tanya; Yuen, Chin Yan Jackie; Donovan, Caroline Leanne; Ireland, Michael

2018-02-19

Despite evidence that e-mental health services are effective, consumer preferences still appear to be in favor of face-to-face services. However, the theory of planned behavior (TPB) suggests that cognitive intentions are more proximal to behavior and thus may have a more direct influence on service use. Investigating individual characteristics that influence both preferences and intentions to use e-mental health services is important for better understanding factors that might impede or facilitate the use of these services. This study explores predictors of preferences and intentions to access e-mental health services relative to face-to-face services. Five domains were investigated (demographics, technology factors, personality, psychopathology, and beliefs), identified from previous studies and informed by the Internet interventions model. We expected that more participants would report intentions to use e-mental health services relative to reported preferences for this type of support and that these 5 domains would be significantly associated with both intentions and preferences toward online services. A mixed sample of 308 community members and university students was recruited through social media and the host institution in Australia. Ages ranged between 17 and 68 years, and 82.5% (254/308) were female. Respondents completed an online survey. Chi-square analysis and t tests were used to explore group differences, and logistic regression models were employed to explore factors predicting preferences and intentions. Most respondents (85.7%, 264/308) preferred face-to-face services over e-mental health services. Relative to preferences, a larger proportion of respondents (39.6%, 122/308) endorsed intentions to use e-mental health services if experiencing mental health difficulties in the future. In terms of the 5 predictor domains, 95% CIs of odds ratios (OR) derived from bootstrapped standard errors suggested that prior experience with online services

Online Communities: researching sociability and usability in hard to reach populations

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jenny Preece

2004-05-01

Full Text Available Thousands of social gatherings - online communities – occur via ICTs across the Internet. They use listservers, bulletin boards, instant messaging, blogs, social network and meeting facilitation systems and purpose-build platforms. Each community is the product of a complex set of interacting variables. Some of these variables come from usability of the software but social factors have a strong influence. Direct cause and effect relationships are often difficult to tease out and identifying criteria for successful online communities can be difficult. Furthermore several disciplines own this topic, each with its own theories, research methods, community of researchers and publication outlets. This is good for multidisciplinary research but it can be challenging. In this paper I discuss two research projects. Each focuses on community populations that are hard to reach. The first analyses why people do not actively participate in online discussions, i.e., lurk. The second is a new project to develop cross-cultural online book communities for children across the world who do not speak each other’s languages. I present the key findings from each project and suggest ways of working with these hard to reach populations.

Online Paper Repositories and the Role of Scholarly Societies: An AERA Conference Report

Science.gov (United States)

Educational Researcher, 2010

2010-01-01

This article examines issues faced by scholarly societies that are developing and sustaining online paper repositories. It is based on the AERA Conference on Online Paper Repositories, which focused on fundamental issues of policy and procedure important to the operations of online working paper repositories. The report and recommendations address…

Distributed Leadership And The Visibility/invisibility Paradox In On-line Communities

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jill Jameson

2011-01-01

Full Text Available This paper analyzes the role of distributed leadership in three on-line communities, reflecting on an observed visibility/invisibility paradox in leadership within these communities. Leaders who downplay their seniority and assume a degree of invisibility, allocating discretionary powers to subordinate levels in an organizational hierarchy, may facilitate the emergence of distributed leadership. Yet, simultaneously, leader-led relations are enabled by high leadership visibility. This paradox—that leaders need to be both highly visible and also invisible, or hands-off, when the occasion requires it—was derived from prior research into e-learning communities and tested in the analysis of discussions from on-line communities using a case study pattern-matching process. The operation of both visibility and invisibility in leadership is a key issue for enabling effective collaborations in distributed leadership situations based on trust. Such collaboration fosters positive group interaction and participative decision making in a consensus facilitated through leadership distribution amongst on-line community members.

Exploring the Mediating Effect of E-social Capital Between Community Members Interaction and Consumer Engagement

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yan Bingsheng

2017-01-01

Full Text Available This article explored the effect of instrumental interaction and relational interaction on consumer engagement (community engagement and brand engagement among community members. The mediating effect of E-social capital was investigated as well. The research results showed that: both instrumental interaction and interpersonal interaction promote the formation of E-social capital (online trust and online reciprocity; online trust plays a partial mediating role between community interaction (instrumental interaction, relational interaction and community engagement, but the influence of online reciprocity on community engagement is not significant; community engagement leads to brand engagement. The findings enrich the theories of brand community and consumer engagement and contribute to the virtual community management.

Online participation: a content analysis of differences in utilization of two online cancer communities by men and women, patients and family members.

Science.gov (United States)

Ginossar, Tamar

2008-01-01

The Internet provides a new modality for health communication by facilitating the creation of virtual communities. These communities have the potential to influence health behavior beyond traditional FTF support groups. This study utilized content analysis of 1,424 e-mail messages posted to 2 online cancer communities to examine uses of these groups. Findings revealed (a) similarities in the content of communication in the 2 virtual communities, (b) gender differences in participation, and (c) differences in utilization of these online groups between patients and family members. These results are discussed in light of the diverse uses of online cancer communities that they reveal, the role of family members in support seeking and provision, and gender communication styles in health computer-mediated communication.

The F. E. College and the Community. Coombe Lodge Report Volume 7 Number 6. Study Conference 74/14.

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Further Education Staff Coll., Blagdon (England).

Speakers at the Coombe Lodge study conference covered a wide range of subjects related to the continuing education college and the community. They include: adult education: the Russell Report, the community, and the college (D. J. Moore); the FE college and the community (A.N. Fairbairn); the Abraham Moss Centre (R. Mitson); the community college…

The fun culture in seniors' online communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Nimrod, Galit

2011-04-01

Previous research found that "fun on line" is the most dominant content in seniors' online communities. The present study aimed to further explore the fun culture in these communities and to discover its unique qualities. The study applied an online ethnography (netnography) approach, utilizing a full year's data from 6 leading seniors' online communities. The final database included about 50,000 posts. The majority of posts were part of online social games, including cognitive, associative, and creative games. The main subjects in all contents were sex, gender differences, aging, grandparenting, politics, faith, and alcohol. Main participatory behaviors were selective timing, using expressive style, and personalization of the online character. Although most participants were "lurkers," the active participants nurtured community norms and relationships, as reflected in the written dialogues. In a reality of limited alternatives for digital games that meet older adults' needs and interests, seniors found an independent system to satisfy their need for play. Seniors' online communities provided a unique form of casual leisure, whose nature varied among different groups of participants. The fun culture seemed to offer participants many desired benefits, including meaningful play, liminality and communitas, opportunity to practice and demonstrate their abilities, and means for coping with aging. Therefore, it may have positive impact on seniors' well-being and successful aging.

Retention of community college students in online courses

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Krajewski, Sarah

The issue of attrition in online courses at higher learning institutions remains a high priority in the United States. A recent rapid growth of online courses at community colleges has been instigated by student demand, as they meet the time constraints many nontraditional community college students have as a result of the need to work and care for dependents. Failure in an online course can cause students to become frustrated with the college experience, financially burdened, or to even give up and leave college. Attrition could be avoided by proper guidance of who is best suited for online courses. This study examined factors related to retention (i.e., course completion) and success (i.e., receiving a C or better) in an online biology course at a community college in the Midwest by operationalizing student characteristics (age, race, gender), student skills (whether or not the student met the criteria to be placed in an AFP course), and external factors (Pell recipient, full/part time status, first term) from the persistence model developed by Rovai. Internal factors from this model were not included in this study. Both univariate analyses and multivariate logistic regression were used to analyze the variables. Results suggest that race and Pell recipient were both predictive of course completion on univariate analyses. However, multivariate analyses showed that age, race, academic load and first term were predictive of completion and Pell recipient was no longer predictive. The univariate results for the C or better showed that age, race, Pell recipient, academic load, and meeting AFP criteria were predictive of success. Multivariate analyses showed that only age, race, and Pell recipient were significant predictors of success. Both regression models explained very little (<15%) of the variability within the outcome variables of retention and success. Therefore, although significant predictors were identified for course completion and retention, there are still

Exploring the Mediating Effect of E-social Capital Between Community Members Interaction and Consumer Engagement

OpenAIRE

Yan Bingsheng; Li Lihua; Sun Hongtao

2017-01-01

This article explored the effect of instrumental interaction and relational interaction on consumer engagement (community engagement and brand engagement) among community members. The mediating effect of E-social capital was investigated as well. The research results showed that: both instrumental interaction and interpersonal interaction promote the formation of E-social capital (online trust and online reciprocity); online trust plays a partial mediating role between community interaction (...

Communities of Practice Transition Online - Lessons learned from NASA's EPO Online Workspace

Science.gov (United States)

Davey, B.

2012-12-01

The Earth Forum Education and Public Outreach (EP/O) community has long interacted to better their practice as a community as well as individually. Working together to share knowledge and grow, they function as a community of practice. In 2009, NASA designed and implemented an online workspace in hopes of promoting the communities continued interactions. This study examines the role of an online workspace component of a community in the work of a community of practice. Much has been studied revealing the importance of communities of practice to organizations, project success, and knowledge management and some of these same successes hold true for virtual communities of practice. Study participants were 75 Education and Public Outreach community members of NASA's Science Mission Directorate Earth Forum. In this mixed methods study, online workspace metrics were used to track participation and a survey completed by 21 members was used to quantify participation. For a more detailed analysis, 15 community members (five highly active users, five average users, and five infrequent users) selected based on survey responses, were interviewed. Finally, survey data was gathered from seven online facilitators to understand their role in the community. Data collected from these 21 community members and five facilitating members suggest that highly active users (logging into the workspace daily), were more likely to have transformative experiences, co-create knowledge, feel ownership of community knowledge, have extended opportunities for community exchange, and find new forms of evaluation. Average users shared some similar characteristics with both the highly active members and infrequent users, representing a group in transition as they become more engaged and active in the online workspace. Inactive users viewed the workspace as having little value, being difficult to navigate, being mainly for gaining basic information about events and community news, and as another demand

Anonymity versus privacy: selective information sharing in online cancer communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Frost, Jeana; Vermeulen, Ivar E; Beekers, Nienke

2014-05-14

Active sharing in online cancer communities benefits patients. However, many patients refrain from sharing health information online due to privacy concerns. Existing research on privacy emphasizes data security and confidentiality, largely focusing on electronic medical records. Patient preferences around information sharing in online communities remain poorly understood. Consistent with the privacy calculus perspective adopted from e-commerce research, we suggest that patients approach online information sharing instrumentally, weighing privacy costs against participation benefits when deciding whether to share certain information. Consequently, we argue that patients prefer sharing clinical information over daily life and identity information that potentially compromises anonymity. Furthermore, we explore whether patients' prior experiences, age, health, and gender affect perceived privacy costs and thus willingness to share information. The goal of the present study is to document patient preferences for sharing information within online health platforms. A total of 115 cancer patients reported sharing intentions for 15 different types of information, demographics, health status, prior privacy experiences, expected community utility, and privacy concerns. Factor analysis on the 15 information types revealed 3 factors coinciding with 3 proposed information categories: clinical, daily life, and identity information. A within-subject ANOVA showed a strong preference for sharing clinical information compared to daily life and identity information (F1,114=135.59, P=.001, η(2)=.93). Also, adverse online privacy experiences, age, and health status negatively affected information-sharing intentions. Female patients shared information less willingly. Respondents' information-sharing intentions depend on dispositional and situational factors. Patients share medical details more willingly than daily life or identity information. The results suggest the need to focus on

Longitudinal Changes in Psychological States in Online Health Community Members: Understanding the Long-Term Effects of Participating in an Online Depression Community.

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Park, Albert; Conway, Mike

2017-03-20

Major depression is a serious challenge at both the individual and population levels. Although online health communities have shown the potential to reduce the symptoms of depression, emotional contagion theory suggests that negative emotion can spread within a community, and prolonged interactions with other depressed individuals has potential to worsen the symptoms of depression. The goals of our study were to investigate longitudinal changes in psychological states that are manifested through linguistic changes in depression community members who are interacting with other depressed individuals. We examined emotion-related language usages using the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) program for each member of a depression community from Reddit. To measure the changes, we applied linear least-squares regression to the LIWC scores against the interaction sequence for each member. We measured the differences in linguistic changes against three online health communities focusing on positive emotion, diabetes, and irritable bowel syndrome. On average, members of an online depression community showed improvement in 9 of 10 prespecified linguistic dimensions: "positive emotion," "negative emotion," "anxiety," "anger," "sadness," "first person singular," "negation," "swear words," and "death." Moreover, these members improved either significantly or at least as much as members of other online health communities. We provide new insights into the impact of prolonged participation in an online depression community and highlight the positive emotion change in members. The findings of this study should be interpreted with caution, because participating in an online depression community is not the sole factor for improvement or worsening of depressive symptoms. Still, the consistent statistical results including comparative analyses with different communities could indicate that the emotion-related language usage of depression community members are improving either

Cooking up an Online Community

Science.gov (United States)

Valone, Lauren

2011-01-01

As museum professionals conceptualize community building, they must now consider the virtual realm. Websites in and of themselves will not generate a community, as it takes sustained communication and interaction by staff to encourage growth. Online communities are complex forces that bring about systematic dualities that in turn stimulate…

Online CTE in the Community College

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Garza Mitchell, Regina L.; Etshim, Rachal; Dietz, Brian T.

2016-01-01

This single-site case study explored how one community college integrated online education into CTE courses and programs. Through semi-structured interviews and document analysis, the study explores how one college integrated online education (fully online, hybrid, and web-enhanced) into areas typically considered "hands-on".…

Value Creation in Online Communities for Educators

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Booth, Sharon E.; Kellogg, Shaun B.

2015-01-01

The popularity and pervasiveness of online communities have led researchers and practitioners alike to closely examine the utility of online communities for supporting and facilitating professional learning. As economic constraints leave fewer resources available for professional development, educators in particular are examining the potential of…

Anonymity Versus Privacy: Selective Information Sharing in Online Cancer Communities

Science.gov (United States)

Vermeulen, Ivar E; Beekers, Nienke

2014-01-01

Background Active sharing in online cancer communities benefits patients. However, many patients refrain from sharing health information online due to privacy concerns. Existing research on privacy emphasizes data security and confidentiality, largely focusing on electronic medical records. Patient preferences around information sharing in online communities remain poorly understood. Consistent with the privacy calculus perspective adopted from e-commerce research, we suggest that patients approach online information sharing instrumentally, weighing privacy costs against participation benefits when deciding whether to share certain information. Consequently, we argue that patients prefer sharing clinical information over daily life and identity information that potentially compromises anonymity. Furthermore, we explore whether patients’ prior experiences, age, health, and gender affect perceived privacy costs and thus willingness to share information. Objective The goal of the present study is to document patient preferences for sharing information within online health platforms. Methods A total of 115 cancer patients reported sharing intentions for 15 different types of information, demographics, health status, prior privacy experiences, expected community utility, and privacy concerns. Results Factor analysis on the 15 information types revealed 3 factors coinciding with 3 proposed information categories: clinical, daily life, and identity information. A within-subject ANOVA showed a strong preference for sharing clinical information compared to daily life and identity information (F 1,114=135.59, P=.001, η2=.93). Also, adverse online privacy experiences, age, and health status negatively affected information-sharing intentions. Female patients shared information less willingly. Conclusions Respondents’ information-sharing intentions depend on dispositional and situational factors. Patients share medical details more willingly than daily life or identity

Developing Online Communities for Librarian Researchers: A Case Study

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Luo, Lili; Kennedy, Marie; Brancolini, Kristine; Stephens, Michael

2017-01-01

This study examines the role of online communities in connecting and supporting librarian researchers, through the analysis of member activities in the online community for academic librarians that attended the 2014 Institute for Research Design in Librarianship (IRDL). The 2014 IRDL cohort members participated in the online community via Twitter…

[Using new media for online consensus conferences and open external review of guidelines - results of two pilot studies].

Science.gov (United States)

Nast, Alexander; Rosumeck, Stefanie; Sporbeck, Birte; Rzany, Berthold

2012-01-01

The development of guidelines almost always requires considerable time and financial resources. An important task is therefore to identify and evaluate online methods that facilitate guideline work. ONLINE CONSENSUS CONFERENCE: During the development of the S2k guideline for the management of staphylococcus aureus infections an online consensus conference was held using an online tool provided by the Deutsche Forschungsnetz in combination with a telephone conference. During the 2-hour meeting, no technical difficulties occurred. A survey among the participants showed that this format had a high rate of acceptance. ONLINE REVIEW: During the development of the update of the German S3-Guidelines for the therapy of psoriasis an external open review was performed. An online platform allowing direct visible commenting was chosen. During the five week period of commenting, 26 users added 160 comments. After the review process, the comments were assessed by the editors and the original authors. The selected instrument provides a suitable means for online commenting of guidelines and facilitates the revision of the text. Copyright © 2012. Published by Elsevier GmbH.

Bereaved parents’ online grief communities

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Christensen, Dorthe Refslund; Hård af Segerstad, Ylva; Kasperowski, Dick

2017-01-01

This article presents results from case studies of online grief communities for bereaved parents in Denmark and Sweden (Christensen & Sandvik 2013, 2015a; Hård af Segerstad & Kasperowski, 2015), analyzing how development of practices and norms for grieving and mourning online are related...... to the conditions for participation in the online forums, and to dominant ideas of grief in society as such. Rooted in contemporary research on grief and mourning, we discuss practices of tabooization, de-tabooization or even re-tabooization in the different online forums and how norms and traditions are performed...

Observation of Online Communities: A Discussion of Online and Offline Observer Roles in Studying Development, Cooperation and Coordination in an Open Source Software Environment

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sladjana V. Nørskov

2011-09-01

Full Text Available This paper addresses the application of observation to online settings with a special focus on observer roles. It draws on a study of online observation of a virtual community, i.e. an open source software (OSS community. The paper examines general and specific advantages and disadvantages of the observer roles in online settings by relating these roles to the same roles assumed in offline settings. The study suggests that under the right circumstances online and offline observation may benefit from being combined as they complement each other well. Quality issues and factors important to elicit trustworthy observational data from online study settings, such as OSS communities, are discussed. A proposition is made concerning how threats to credibility and transferability in relation to online observation (i.e. lack of richness and detail, risk of misunderstandings can be diminished, while maintaining the level of dependability (which is potentially high due to a greater degree of anonymity and "isolation" in online settings. The paper thus suggests that the less participative the researcher's online observer role is, the more s/he should consider introducing offline data collection techniques rather than adopting a more participative role in the observed online setting. This methodological discussion forms the basis for making a well-considered choice of online observer role rather than passively sliding into a role assigned by the setting. URN: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs110358

3rd Computer Science On-line Conference

CERN Document Server

Senkerik, Roman; Oplatkova, Zuzana; Silhavy, Petr; Prokopova, Zdenka

2014-01-01

This book is based on the research papers presented in the 3rd Computer Science On-line Conference 2014 (CSOC 2014).   The conference is intended to provide an international forum for discussions on the latest high-quality research results in all areas related to Computer Science. The topics addressed are the theoretical aspects and applications of Artificial Intelligences, Computer Science, Informatics and Software Engineering.   The authors provide new approaches and methods to real-world problems, and in particular, exploratory research that describes novel approaches in their field. Particular emphasis is laid on modern trends in selected fields of interest. New algorithms or methods in a variety of fields are also presented.   This book is divided into three sections and covers topics including Artificial Intelligence, Computer Science and Software Engineering. Each section consists of new theoretical contributions and applications which can be used for the further development of knowledge of everybod...

The Virtual International Day of the Midwife: A Synchronous Open Online Conference for Continuing Professional Development and Learning for Midwives

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sidebotham, Mary; Dalsgaard, Annette; Davis, Deborah

2015-01-01

AIM: To examine the contribution of the Virtual International Day of the Midwife (VIDM) conference to midwives' continuing professional development (CPD). BACKGROUND: Knowledge and understanding of CPD for midwives as synchronous online learning is limited. Studies of e-learning programs for CPD...... to participants for 1 month after the conference via the wiki page in 2012 and 2013. FINDINGS: The survey was completed by 239 conference participants. Midwifery students and clinical midwives were the largest groups of attendees. The most common countries of residence were Australia, United Kingdom, and United...... States. Respondents believed that the conference contributed to their professional development by enabling professional growth, facilitating shared learning, and raising awareness of global issues. CONCLUSION: Offering synchronous events is important to facilitate deeper learning for those engaging...

Proceedings of the 2014 ACM international conference on Interactive experiences for TV and online video

NARCIS (Netherlands)

P. Olivier (Patrick); P. Wright; T. Bartindale; M. Obrist (Marianna); P.S. Cesar Garcia (Pablo Santiago); S. Basapur

2014-01-01

htmlabstractIt is our great pleasure to introduce the 2014 ACM International Conference on Interactive Experiences for Television and Online Video -- ACM TVX 2014. ACM TVX is a leading annual conference that brings together international researchers and practitioners from a wide range of

The Interplay Between Online and Offline Community Culture

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kornum, Niels; Gyrd-Jones, Richard; Al Zagir, Nadia

This study examines the interplay between online and offline community cultures based on identifying the distinct features of both. Studying this interaction explicitly and in empirical analysis is new to community literature and brands can through this better know the communities to which...... they relate. The findings reveal that without a thorough understanding of both online and offline cultures and their interaction, companies or brands may get a misleading picture of these cultures. For instance, if only looking at the culture online and not core values offline, the company might intervene...

Understanding on-line community: the affordances of virtual space

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Karen Ruhleder

2002-01-01

Full Text Available Increasing numbers of on-line venues for learning are emerging as virtual communities become more accessible and commonplace. This paper looks at one particular virtual community, an on-line degree programme at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, which offers an M.S. in Library and Information Science (called LEEP. It draws on a framework presented by Mynatt, et al. (1998, which provides a lens for talking about on-line community as a set of affordances. This framework is applied to illustrate the interactions, artefacts, and expectations that shape this community.

Community desires for an online health information strategy.

Science.gov (United States)

Dart, Jared M; Gallois, Cindy

2010-11-01

To determine whether the community's attitudes to components of a community eHealth strategy differ across three different socioeconomic groups. A survey questionnaire was designed and implemented across three different communities. Paper-based surveys were left in community organisations and local health practices in a low socioeconomic community on the outskirts of Ipswich, Queensland (n = 262), a mid-high socioeconomic community in the western suburbs of Brisbane (n = 256) and at a local university (n = 200). Ascribed importance and comfort with proposed components of a community eHealth strategy. A community-oriented health website was perceived as useful in getting access to relevant health information. Those who were most comfortable with accessing online health information were those who were: experienced, had home internet access and were frequent internet users. The most important types of health information for the website were: information about the treatment of conditions, how to manage a chronic illness, how to stay healthy and patient clinical pathways. The low socioeconomic community had different information priorities – all categories were considered more important, particularly information about how the public system operates, local health support groups, and the roles of health professionals. Different communities have different information demands but there is a strong demand for information which empowers community members to take control of their own health and become active participants in their health care. Tools such as a community health portal and patient clinical pathways should become more available.

Bridging Social Capital in Online Communities: Heterogeneity and Social Tolerance of Online Game Players in Japan

Science.gov (United States)

Kobayashi, Tetsuro

2010-01-01

This article examines the democratic potential of online communities by investigating the influence of network heterogeneity on social tolerance in an online gaming environment. Online game communities are potential sources of bridging social capital because they tend to be relatively heterogeneous. Causal analyses are conducted using structural…

Website Sharing in Online Health Communities: A Descriptive Analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Nath, Chinmoy; Huh, Jina; Adupa, Abhishek Kalyan; Jonnalagadda, Siddhartha R

2016-01-13

An increasing number of people visit online health communities to seek health information. In these communities, people share experiences and information with others, often complemented with links to different websites. Understanding how people share websites can help us understand patients' needs in online health communities and improve how peer patients share health information online. Our goal was to understand (1) what kinds of websites are shared, (2) information quality of the shared websites, (3) who shares websites, (4) community differences in website-sharing behavior, and (5) the contexts in which patients share websites. We aimed to find practical applications and implications of website-sharing practices in online health communities. We used regular expressions to extract URLs from 10 WebMD online health communities. We then categorized the URLs based on their top-level domains. We counted the number of trust codes (eg, accredited agencies' formal evaluation and PubMed authors' institutions) for each website to assess information quality. We used descriptive statistics to determine website-sharing activities. To understand the context of the URL being discussed, we conducted a simple random selection of 5 threads that contained at least one post with URLs from each community. Gathering all other posts in these threads resulted in 387 posts for open coding analysis with the goal of understanding motivations and situations in which website sharing occurred. We extracted a total of 25,448 websites. The majority of the shared websites were .com (59.16%, 15,056/25,448) and WebMD internal (23.2%, 5905/25,448) websites; the least shared websites were social media websites (0.15%, 39/25,448). High-posting community members and moderators posted more websites with trust codes than low-posting community members did. The heart disease community had the highest percentage of websites containing trust codes compared to other communities. Members used websites to

Contesting Community Online: Virtual Imagery among Dutch Orthodox Protestant Homosexuals

NARCIS (Netherlands)

W. de Koster (Willem)

2010-01-01

textabstractAbstract Whereas substantial scholarly attention has been paid to the online presentation of self, symbolic interactionist approaches are largely absent in the literature on virtual communities. Instead, recurrent questions are whether communities can exist online and if specific online

Research on gender differences in online health communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Xuan; Sun, Min; Li, Jia

2018-03-01

With the growing concern about health issues and the emergence of online communities based on user-generated content (UGC), more and more people are participating in online health communities (OHCs) to exchange opinions and health information. This paper aims to examine whether and how male and female users behave differently in OHCs. Using data from a leading diabetes community in China (Tianmijiayuan), we incorporate three different techniques: topic modeling analysis, sentiment analysis and friendship network analysis to investigate gender differences in chronic online health communities. The results indicated that (1) Male users' posting content was usually more professional and included more medical terms. Comparatively speaking, female users were more inclined to seek emotional support in the health communities. (2) Female users expressed more negative emotions than male users did, especially anxiety and sadness. (3) In addition, male users were more centered and influential in the friendship network than were women. Through these analyses, our research revealed the behavioral characteristics and needs for different gender users in online health communities. Gaining a deeper understanding of gender differences in OHCs can serve as guidance to better meet the information needs, emotional needs and relationship needs of male and female patients. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

A Breath of Fresh Air / Une boufée d’air frais: Abstracts from the 2012 Canadian Respiratory Conference

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Pearce Wilcox

2012-01-01

Full Text Available The present online supplement highlights the poster abstracts selected for presentation at the 5th Annual Canadian Respiratory Conference (CRC held in Vancouver, British Columbia, in April 2012. The CRC is a partnership initiative of the Canadian Thoracic Society, Canadian Respiratory Health Professionals, The Lung Association and the Canadian COPD Alliance and has become the premiere national educational and scientific meeting for the respiratory community in Canada. I would like to acknowledge the leadership and expertise of the Scientific Committee, our conference speakers and abstract presenters, all of whom contributed to the delivery of an excellent program. The next Canadian Respiratory Conference will be held in Québec City, Quebec, April 11 to 13, 2012 (www.lung.ca/crc. We look forward to seeing you there!

Online Community Transition Detection

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Tan, Biying; Zhu, Feida; Qu, Qiang

2014-01-01

communities over time. How to automatically detect the online community transitions of individual users is a research problem of immense practical value yet with great technical challenges. In this paper, we propose an algorithm based on the Minimum Description Length (MDL) principle to trace the evolution......Mining user behavior patterns in social networks is of great importance in user behavior analysis, targeted marketing, churn prediction and other applications. However, less effort has been made to study the evolution of user behavior in social communities. In particular, users join and leave...... of community transition of individual users, adaptive to the noisy behavior. Experiments on real data sets demonstrate the efficiency and effectiveness of our proposed method....

Online personal ads: community and sex, virtually.

Science.gov (United States)

Gudelunas, David

2005-01-01

This study samples 200 personal advertisements from the online gay and lesbian global Web portal PlanetOut. This data, along with survey responses completed by advertisers included in the sample, are used to frame a discussion on the use of online gay and lesbian spaces and communities. Despite interacting in a global space, data showed that advertisers remained aware of their local identities. Differences between advertisers were most notable between gender and whether they logged on in a small or large town. Advertisers were interested in interacting locally, eager to move from online to offline communication, often-times not overly concerned with maintaining anonymity, and not interested in toying with multiple identities. Users of PlanetOut personals largely did not consider themselves part of a virtual gay and lesbian community even when they recognized the existence of a local geographically-based gay and lesbian community. However, the dynamic nature of online personal advertisements did allow for a new type of interactive advertisement that does differ from previous print forums.

Brand Resonance Behavior among Online Brand Community

OpenAIRE

Shaari, Hasnizam; Ahmad, Intan Shafinaz

2017-01-01

Brand commitment studies had gained considerable attention in today’s marketing practices. Sustaining the brand competitive advantages become challenging especially in the context of digital marketing. Development of Web 2.0 that enables interactive communication had offered a new mechanism for owner of the brand to strengthen the bond among their admirers and users via online brand community. Attitude and behavior of online brand community members can be crucial to overall brand competitive...

"E-tivities from the Front Line”: A Community of Inquiry Case Study Analysis of Educators’ Blog Posts on the Topic of Designing and Delivering Online Learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Phemie Wright

2014-04-01

Full Text Available Designing and implementing successful online learning has been at the forefront of institutional agendas since digital learning increased in market demand over the last decade. However there is still ongoing debate as to the “how” of this arduous task. The Community of Inquiry (CoI is one learning design method that has seen potential in the field, but practical implementation of designing for the important components of Social, Cognitive and Teaching Presence have yet to be fully realised. This paper researches an e-learning design strategy called E-tivities as a suggested possible method for designing for CoI components. The research explored recent online blog posts of experienced learning designers’ and educators’ experience in designing successful online learning using E-tivities. Results suggest the E-tivities do have the potential to cater for all Presences of CoI. Specifically when using E-tivities to design online learning Affective Expression was the highest reported Social Presence design factor. All four components of Cognitive Presence appeared to be present in E-tivities design. The most important component for adequate Teaching Presence factors was the initial Design and Organisation of the course. E-tivities and the 5-Stage Model provides a solid framework for this to occur.

Health-related hot topic detection in online communities using text clustering.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yingjie Lu

Full Text Available Recently, health-related social media services, especially online health communities, have rapidly emerged. Patients with various health conditions participate in online health communities to share their experiences and exchange healthcare knowledge. Exploring hot topics in online health communities helps us better understand patients' needs and interest in health-related knowledge. However, the statistical topic analysis employed in previous studies is becoming impractical for processing the rapidly increasing amount of online data. Automatic topic detection based on document clustering is an alternative approach for extracting health-related hot topics in online communities. In addition to the keyword-based features used in traditional text clustering, we integrate medical domain-specific features to represent the messages posted in online health communities. Three disease discussion boards, including boards devoted to lung cancer, breast cancer and diabetes, from an online health community are used to test the effectiveness of topic detection. Experiment results demonstrate that health-related hot topics primarily include symptoms, examinations, drugs, procedures and complications. Further analysis reveals that there also exist some significant differences among the hot topics discussed on different types of disease discussion boards.

Simulating Social Networks of Online Communities: Simulation as a Method for Sociability Design

Science.gov (United States)

Ang, Chee Siang; Zaphiris, Panayiotis

We propose the use of social simulations to study and support the design of online communities. In this paper, we developed an Agent-Based Model (ABM) to simulate and study the formation of social networks in a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) guild community. We first analyzed the activities and the social network (who-interacts-with-whom) of an existing guild community to identify its interaction patterns and characteristics. Then, based on the empirical results, we derived and formalized the interaction rules, which were implemented in our simulation. Using the simulation, we reproduced the observed social network of the guild community as a means of validation. The simulation was then used to examine how various parameters of the community (e.g. the level of activity, the number of neighbors of each agent, etc) could potentially influence the characteristic of the social networks.

Similarity between community structures of different online social networks and its impact on underlying community detection

Science.gov (United States)

Fan, W.; Yeung, K. H.

2015-03-01

As social networking services are popular, many people may register in more than one online social network. In this paper we study a set of users who have accounts of three online social networks: namely Foursquare, Facebook and Twitter. Community structure of this set of users may be reflected in these three online social networks. Therefore, high correlation between these reflections and the underlying community structure may be observed. In this work, community structures are detected in all three online social networks. Also, we investigate the similarity level of community structures across different networks. It is found that they show strong correlation with each other. The similarity between different networks may be helpful to find a community structure close to the underlying one. To verify this, we propose a method to increase the weights of some connections in networks. With this method, new networks are generated to assist community detection. By doing this, value of modularity can be improved and the new community structure match network's natural structure better. In this paper we also show that the detected community structures of online social networks are correlated with users' locations which are identified on Foursquare. This information may also be useful for underlying community detection.

Strategic Decision Making in Community Colleges: An Exploration of Issues Relevant to Decision Making to Confer Community College Baccalaureate Degrees

Science.gov (United States)

Currier, Charles W.

2012-01-01

This qualitative case study explores the process community college senior administrators employ when assessing the complex strategic decision to confer community college baccalaureate degrees. Strategic opportunities, such as conferring baccalaureate degrees, occur infrequently thus community college leaders must be prepared to act quickly and…

1st International Conference on Communities and Technologies

CERN Document Server

Wenger, Etienne; Wulf, Volker

2003-01-01

The book contains 24 research articles related to the emerging research field of Communities and Technologies (C&T). The papers treat subjects such as online communities, communities of practice, Community support systems, Digital Cities, regional communities and the internet, knowledge sharing and communities, civil communities, communities and education and social capital. As a result of a very quality-oriented review process, the work reflects the best of current research and practice in the field of C&T.

Children’s Civic Engagement in the Scratch Online Community

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ricarose Roque

2016-09-01

Full Text Available In public discourse, and in the governance of online communities, young people are often denied agency. Children are frequently considered objects to protect, safeguard, and manage. Yet as children go online from very early ages, they develop emergent forms of civic and political engagement. Children appropriate the affordances of digital platforms in order to discuss, connect, and act with their peers and in their communities. In this paper, we analyze civic engagement in Scratch Online, a creative community where children from around the world learn programming by designing and sharing interactive media projects. We explore the ways that young Scratch community members connect with issues of global importance, as well as with local topics and questions of community governance. We develop a typology of the strategies they use to express themselves, engage with their peers, and call for action. We then analyze the reaction of the community, including other Scratch members and adult moderators, and draw key lessons from these examples in order to describe guidelines for educators and designers who would like to support children’s rights to civic engagement in online learning environments.

Proceedings of the 6th Computer Science On-line Conference 2017

CERN Document Server

Senkerik, Roman; Oplatkova, Zuzana; Prokopova, Zdenka; Silhavy, Petr

2017-01-01

This book presents new methods and approaches to real-world problems as well as exploratory research that describes novel artificial intelligence applications, including deep learning, neural networks and hybrid algorithms. This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Artificial Intelligence Trends in Intelligent Systems Section of the 6th Computer Science On-line Conference 2017 (CSOC 2017), held in April 2017. .

Disseminating online tools for building capacity among community practitioners.

Science.gov (United States)

Holt, Christina M; Fawcett, Stephen B; Schultz, Jerry A; Jones, Jami A; Berkowitz, Bill; Wolff, Thomas J; Francisco, Vincent T; Rabinowitz, Philip W

2013-01-01

To prepare the workforce for building healthier communities, we need to assure capabilities of a diverse and geographically distributed community of practitioners. Although the Internet is used extensively to disseminate practice information, less is known about the relative impact of various strategies for promoting its use. This empirical case study examines implementation of dissemination strategies and their association with increased user sessions in the online Community Tool Box (CTB), a widely used resource for community building. Dissemination activities included social media efforts, eNewsletters, search engine optimization efforts, partnering with other Web sites, and implementing a global Out of the Box Prize. Results suggest that increased user sessions were associated with search optimization and "mashups" delivering CTB content through partners' Web sites. The report concludes with a discussion of challenges and opportunities in promoting widespread use of capacity-building tools among those working to improve their communities.

Navigating cancer using online communities: a grounded theory of survivor and family experiences.

Science.gov (United States)

Harkin, Lydia Jo; Beaver, Kinta; Dey, Paola; Choong, Kartina

2017-12-01

People affected by cancer often have unmet emotional and social support needs. Online cancer communities are a convenient channel for connecting cancer survivors, allowing them to support one another. However, it is unclear whether online community use makes a meaningful contribution to cancer survivorship, as little previous research has examined the experience of using contemporary cancer communities. We aimed to explore the experiences of visitors to online cancer communities. Twenty-three in-depth interviews were conducted with online cancer community visitors, including cancer survivors (n = 18), family members (n = 2), and individuals who were both a survivor and family member (n = 3). Interviews were analysed using a grounded theory approach. A theory developed explaining how individuals 'navigated' the experience of cancer using online cancer communities. Online advice and information led participants on a 'journey to become informed'. Online friendships normalised survivorship and cast participants on a 'journey to recreate identity'. Participants navigated a 'journey through different worlds' as they discovered relevant and hidden communities. This theory highlights virtual paths people affected by cancer can take to self-manage their experience of the disease. Online community experiences can be improved by promoting online evaluation skills and signposting visitors to bereavement support. Cancer survivors can benefit through both lurking and posting in online communities. However, individuals risk becoming distressed when they befriend individuals who may soon die. Additionally, people affected by rarer cancers can struggle to find shared experiences online and may need to look elsewhere for support.

COPD360social Online Community: A Social Media Review.

Science.gov (United States)

Stellefson, Michael; Paige, Samantha R; Alber, Julia M; Stewart, Margaret

2018-06-01

People living with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) commonly report feelings of loneliness and social isolation due to lack of support from family, friends, and health care providers. COPD360social is an interactive and disease-specific online community and social network dedicated to connecting people living with COPD to evidence-based resources. Through free access to collaborative forums, members can explore, engage, and discuss an array of disease-related topics, such as symptom management. This social media review provides an overview of COPD360social, specifically its features that practitioners can leverage to facilitate patient-provider communication, knowledge translation, and community building. The potential of COPD360social for chronic disease self-management is maximized through community recognition programming and interactive friend-finding tools that encourage members to share their own stories through blogs and multimedia (e.g., images, videos). The platform also fosters collaborative knowledge dissemination and helping relationships among patients, family members, friends, and health care providers. Successful implementation of COPD360social has dramatically expanded patient education and self-management support resources for people affected by COPD. Practitioners should refer patients and their families to online social networks such as COPD360social to increase knowledge and awareness of evidence-based chronic disease management practices.

Using Netnography to Explore the Culture of Online Language Teaching Communities

Science.gov (United States)

Kulavuz-Onal, Derya

2015-01-01

Netnography (Kozinets, 2010) is an ethnographic approach to study communities that exist primarily online. Engaging in online participant observation, the netnographer connects to the online community through a computer screen, and the field is located inside the screen. Although it has been used in marketing research extensively, netnography is a…

Examining Sense of Community among Medical Professionals in an Online Graduate Program

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kadriye O. Lewis

2015-01-01

Full Text Available As the number of online degree programs continues to grow, one of the greatest challenges is developing a sense of community among learners who do not convene at the same time and place. This study examined the sense of community among medical professionals in an online graduate program for healthcare professionals. We took the sample from a fully online program delivered jointly by a state university and a local children's hospital in the Midwest. We administered Rovai's Classroom Community Survey with 11 additional demographic questions. We also utilized online interviews to further explore students’ understanding of sense of community. A bi-factor model was fitted to the online sense of community survey data. Using multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA and univariate analysis of variance (ANOVA we identified potential group differences. The qualitative data were analyzed thematically in a recursive and iterative process. Study results suggested that a dominant factor existed: sense of community with two sub-domain factors including sense of learning and sense of connectedness. No significant differences in sense of community with regard to gender, native language, or area of medical practice were detected. However, results showed a difference in sense of community between the three courses examined. This study is the first to examine the sense of community among online medical professionals. Since our findings are in contrast to those of previous studies, this opens the door to additional studies around the possible differences between the community characteristics and needs of medical professionals as online students.

Teaching and learning community work online: can e-learning promote competences for future practice?

OpenAIRE

Larsen, Anne Karin; Visser-Rotgans, Rina; Hole, Grete Oline

2011-01-01

This article presents a case study of an online course in Community Work and the learning outcomes for an international group of students participating in the course. Examples from the process of, and results from the development of virtual-learning material are presented. Finally, the students' learning experience and competences achieved by the use of innovative learning material and ICT communication tools are presented.

Are online communities on par with experts in the evaluation of new movies?

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ponnamma Divakaran, Pradeep Kumar; Nørskov, Sladjana

2016-01-01

Purpose This paper investigates two questions. First, are movie-based online community evaluations on par with film expert evaluations of new movies? Second, which group makes more reliable and accurate predictions of movie box office revenues: film reviewers or an online community? Design....../methodology/approach Data were collected from a movie-based online community Fandango for a 16-month period and included all movies released during this time (373 movies). We compared film reviewers’ evaluations with the online community evaluations during the first eight weeks of the movie’s release. Findings The study...... finds that community members evaluate movies differently than film reviewers. The results also reveal that community evaluations have more predictive power than film reviewers’ evaluations, especially during the opening week of a movie. Research limitations/implications The investigated online community...

'Keep complaining til someone listens': Exchanges of tacit healthcare knowledge in online illness communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Foster, Drew

2016-10-01

This article examines online exchanges of advice and knowledge among patients. It draws a distinction between explicit healthcare knowledge (i.e., facts about symptoms and treatments) and tacit healthcare knowledge (i.e., know-how about navigating the healthcare system). Based on analysis of message board interactions at a prominent online illness community, I find that patients routinely encourage one another to exercise agency strategically in clinical encounters by honing specific interactional skills. I isolate three major techniques that are advocated within the community (affect regulation, information management, and treatment persistence) and frame them as discrete examples of tacit healthcare knowledge. I argue that tacit healthcare knowledge constitutes a potentially potent source of empowerment for patients that can help them to receive their desired form of care from the health system and to negotiate relationships with medical professionals and institutions. I conclude by discussing how the concept of tacit healthcare knowledge further clarifies the wide variety of lay knowledge exchanged among patients online. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Aggregate-then-Curate: how digital learning champions help communities nurture online content

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Andrew Whitworth

2012-12-01

Full Text Available Informational resources are essential for communities, rooting them in their own history, helping them learn and solve problems, giving them a voice in decision-making and so on. For digital inclusion – and inclusion in the informational and democratic processes of society more generally – it is essential that communities retain the skills, awareness and motivation to create and manage their own informational resources.This article explores a model for the creation of online content that incorporates the different ways in which the quality and relevance of information can be assured. This model, “Aggregate-then-Curate” (A/C, was developed from earlier work concerning digital inclusion in UK online centres, models of informal e-learning and ecologies of resources. A/C shows how creating online content can be viewed as a 7-step process, initiated by individuals but bringing in “digital learning champions”, other community members and formal educational institutions at different stages. A/C can be used to design training to help build the capacity to manage community informational resources in an inclusive way. The article then discusses and evaluates MOSI-ALONG, a Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC funded project founded on these ideas, which illustrates how A/C can be used to design training to help build the capacity to manage community informational resources in an inclusive way. This conclusion is supported by evaluations of the work done so far in MOSI-ALONG.

E-Marketing: Are Community Colleges Embracing the Web?

Science.gov (United States)

Clagett, Craig

2001-01-01

Conducted a pilot survey of community colleges to assess their online marketing efforts. Found that while all had Web sites, only a minority of sites were truly interactive. Involvement of marketing offices with Web sites varied considerably, and a minority had used e-mail or Web ads for marketing. (EV)

Inferring Smoking Status from User Generated Content in an Online Cessation Community.

Science.gov (United States)

Amato, Michael S; Papandonatos, George D; Cha, Sarah; Wang, Xi; Zhao, Kang; Cohn, Amy M; Pearson, Jennifer L; Graham, Amanda L

2018-01-22

User generated content (UGC) is a valuable but underutilized source of information about individuals who participate in online cessation interventions. This study represents a first effort to passively detect smoking status among members of an online cessation program using UGC. Secondary data analysis was performed on data from 826 participants in a web-based smoking cessation randomized trial that included an online community. Domain experts from the online community reviewed each post and comment written by participants and attempted to infer the author's smoking status at the time it was written. Inferences from UGC were validated by comparison with self-reported 30-day point prevalence abstinence (PPA). Following validation, the impact of this method was evaluated across all individuals and timepoints in the study period. Of the 826 participants in the analytic sample, 719 had written at least one post from which content inference was possible. Among participants for whom unambiguous smoking status was inferred during the 30 days preceding their 3-month follow-up survey, concordance with self-report was almost perfect (kappa = 0.94). Posts indicating abstinence tended to be written shortly after enrollment (median = 14 days). Passive inference of smoking status from UGC in online cessation communities is possible and highly reliable for smokers who actively produce content. These results lay the groundwork for further development of observational research tools and intervention innovations. © The Author(s) 2018. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Effortless consumption : The 'Anthropologie' of a brand-focused online shopping community

OpenAIRE

Downing Peters, Lauren; Kurennaya, Anya

2014-01-01

This article examines the dynamics of the brand-focused online community blog Effortless Anthropologie, devoted to the popular retailer Anthropologie, with particular emphasis on how brand values are created, espoused and disputed by its members in a dynamic and interactive online forum. Using relevant literature on the concept of brand community, the net is expanded to capture the activities of a community that exists primarily online. We use examples of posts and commenting activity to demo...

Britishness and Community Cohesion in Muslim News Online

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hassen ZRIBA

2013-12-01

Full Text Available The issues of British national identity and social cohesion have become pressing concerns within the multicultural fabric of contemporary British society. The increasing number of immigrants and their offspring, along with the maintenance of their cultural roots, seem to represent a serious defiance to social cohesion and the alleged “purity” of Britishness. A number of race related reports were produced by the official authorities to churn out the necessary steps to be followed by the British (immigrants and host community in order to keep social stability and community cohesion. Thus, the politics of community cohesion came to the fore as the neologism of contemporary British political discourse. Such new discourse of governance has been digested and processed differently by different mass media. It has been decoded, for instance, preferably by mainstream news agencies like BBC News Online. However, arguably, it is read appositionally or at best negotiatedly by ethnicity-related news agencies such as Muslim News Online. In this article, attempt has been made to adopt media discourse analysis tools to decipher the ways Muslim News Online decoded and then encoded the hegemonic official discourses of Britishness and community cohesion. A critical and interpretative approach is used to accomplish such study. The corpus of this study is primarily extracted from the website of the Muslim News Online.

Understanding persistence in the use of online fitness communities : comparing novice and experienced users

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Stragier, Jeroen; Vanden Abeele, Mariek; Mechant, Peter; De Marez, Lieven

2016-01-01

Mobile and wearable technologies facilitate physiological data collection for health and wellness purposes. Users typically access these data via Online Fitness Community (OFC) platforms (e.g., Fitbit, Strava, RunKeeper). These platforms present users with functionalities centered on

Building addiction recovery capital through online participation in a recovery community.

Science.gov (United States)

Bliuc, Ana-Maria; Best, David; Iqbal, Muhammad; Upton, Katie

2017-11-01

This study examines how online participation in a community of recovery contributes to personal journeys of recovery. It investigates whether recovery capital building - as indicated by increased levels and quality of online social interactions - and markers of positive identity development predict retention in a recovery program designed around fostering community involvement for early stage recovery addicts. It was predicted that online participation on the group's Facebook page and positive identity development are associated to retention in the program. To map how participants interact online, social network analysis (SNA) based on naturally occurring online data (N = 609) on the Facebook page of a recovery community was conducted. Computerised linguistic analyses evaluated sentiment of the textual data (capturing social identity markers). Linear regression analyses evaluated whether indicators of recovery capital predict program retention. To illustrate the findings in the context of the specific recovery community, presented are two case studies of key participants who moved from the periphery to the centre of the social network. By conducting in-depth interviews with these participants, personal experiences of engagement in the online community of group members who have undergone the most significant changes since joining the community are explored. Retention in the program was determined by a) the number of comment 'likes' and all 'likes' received on the Facebook page; b) position in the social network (degree of centrality); and c) linguistic content around group identity and achievement. Positive online interactions between members of recovery communities support the recovery process through helping participants to develop recovery capital that binds them to groups supportive of positive change. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Links between real and virtual networks: a comparative study of online communities in Japan and Korea.

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Ishii, Kenichi; Ogasahara, Morihiro

2007-04-01

The present study explores how online communities affect real-world personal relations based on a cross-cultural survey conducted in Japan and Korea. Findings indicate that the gratifications of online communities moderate the effects of online communities on social participation. Online communities are categorized into a real-group-based community and a virtual-network-based community. The membership of real-group-based online community is positively correlated with social bonding gratification and negatively correlated with information- seeking gratification. Japanese users prefer more virtual-network-based online communities, while their Korean counterparts prefer real-group-based online communities. Korean users are more active in online communities and seek a higher level of socializing gratifications, such as social bonding and making new friends, when compared with their Japanese counterparts. These results indicate that in Korea, personal relations via the online community are closely associated with the real-world personal relations, but this is not the case in Japan. This study suggests that the effects of the Internet are culture-specific and that the online community can serve a different function in different cultural environments.

Building online learning communities in a graduate dental hygiene program.

Science.gov (United States)

Rogo, Ellen J; Portillo, Karen M

2014-08-01

The literature abounds with research related to building online communities in a single course; however, limited evidence is available on this phenomenon from a program perspective. The intent of this qualitative case study inquiry was to explore student experiences in a graduate dental hygiene program contributing or impeding the development and sustainability of online learning communities. Approval from the IRB was received. A purposive sampling technique was used to recruit participants from a stratification of students and graduates. A total of 17 participants completed semi-structured interviews. Data analysis was completed through 2 rounds - 1 for coding responses and 1 to construct categories of experiences. The participants' collective definition of an online learning community was a complex synergistic network of interconnected people who create positive energy. The findings indicated the development of this network began during the program orientation and was beneficial for building a foundation for the community. Students felt socially connected and supported by the network. Course design was another important category for participation in weekly discussions and group activities. Instructors were viewed as active participants in the community, offering helpful feedback and being a facilitator in discussions. Experiences impeding the development of online learning communities related to the poor performance of peers and instructors. Specific categories of experiences supported and impeded the development of online learning communities related to the program itself, course design, students and faculty. These factors are important to consider in order to maximize student learning potential in this environment. Copyright © 2014 The American Dental Hygienists’ Association.

Penggunaan Tablet di Binus Online Learning

OpenAIRE

Agus Putranto; Wawan Saputra

2014-01-01

Utilization of e-learning can improve learning effectiveness and flexibility. Features of e-learning that are important in teaching and learning activities are tasks features, discussion forums and discussion face to face in a video conference. BINUS Online Learning is a program that offers students to conduct online lectures. Online BINUS need to think about software and hardware that must be provided in a tablet. Therefore, this study will analyze the use of the tablet which will be used fo...

Online Knowledge Communities: Meeting places for continuing professional development.

NARCIS (Netherlands)

de Vries, Sjoerd A.; van Weert, Tom J.; Munro, Robert K.

2003-01-01

This paper describes the concept of Online Knowledge Communities (okc) as meeting places for continuing professional development (cpd). An okc is defined as a social network of members, who are online and are organized by making use of an online knowledge center. The okc has a particular group

Technology and Community Behavior in Online Environments

Science.gov (United States)

Blanchard, Anita L.; Markus, M. Lynne

The literature on virtual or online communities contains two largely disjoint bodies of scholarship. One, which we call the “communities” literature, is concerned primarily with the social and psychological processes observable within groups of people that interact regularly in online environments. The other, concerned primarily with the effects of technological environments on individual and group behavior, we call the “environments” literature.

Antecedents of citizenship behaviour in online customer communities: An empirical investigation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mercy Mpinganjira

2016-08-01

Full Text Available Background: Use of online communities for knowledge generation has become a common phenomenon. In order for online communities to serve as affective spaces for knowledge generation and exchange, members need to behave in ways that are in line with good citizenship. However, because of the limited research, not much is known about citizenship behaviour in such communities and the factors that foster such conduct. Objectives: This article aims to examine the performance of citizenship behaviours by members of online customer communities, and the factors that influence this. Methodology: Data were collected from 303 contributing members of online customer communities using a structured questionnaire. Structural equation modelling was used to analyse the data collected. Results: The findings show moderate levels of engagement in citizenship behaviours among the respondents. Engagement in citizenship behaviours was in general found to be influenced more by the level of affective commitment towards the community than by the perceived levels of social support. Both affective commitment and perceived social support were found to have less influence on compliant citizenship behaviour when compared with altruism and personal initiative. Affective commitment was found to influence personal initiative most strongly, while social support had its strongest influence on altruism. Conclusion: The results provide insights for managers of online customer communities into factors to which they should give attention in order to enhance the performance of citizenship behaviours.

Community (in) Colleges: The Relationship Between Online Network Involvement and Academic Outcomes at a Community College

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Evans, Eliza D.; McFarland, Daniel A.; Rios-Aguilar, Cecilia; Deil-Amen, Regina

2016-01-01

Objective: This study explores the relationship between online social network involvement and academic outcomes among community college students. Prior theory hypothesizes that socio-academic moments are especially important for the integration of students into community colleges and that integration is related to academic outcomes. Online social…

Informal Learning in Online Knowledge Communities: Predicting Community Response to Visitor Inquiries

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Nistor, Nicolae; Dascalu, Mihai; Stavarache, Lucia Larise; Serafin, Yvonne; Trausan-Matu, Stefan

2016-01-01

Nistor, N., Dascalu, M., Stavarache, L.L., Serafin, Y., & Trausan-Matu, S. (2015). Informal Learning in Online Knowledge Communities: Predicting Community Response to Visitor Inquiries. In G. Conole, T. Klobucar, C. Rensing, J. Konert & É. Lavoué (Eds.), 10th European Conf. on Technology Enhanced

Community in Online Higher Education: Challenges and Opportunities

Science.gov (United States)

Arasaratnam-Smith, Lily A.; Northcote, Maria

2017-01-01

Exploring the challenges and opportunities associated with the concepts of community and communication in online higher education, this paper reconsiders the intention to replicate face-to-face learning and teaching strategies in online learning environments. Rather than beginning with the assumption that face-to-face education is the prototype…

Online Communities: The Case of Immigrants in Greece

Science.gov (United States)

Panaretou, Ioannis; Karousos, Nikos; Kostopoulos, Ioannis; Foteinou, Georgia-Barbara; Pavlidis, Giorgos

Immigrants in Greece are an increasing population, very often threatened by poverty and social exclusion. At the same time Greek government has no formal policy concerning their assimilation in Greek society and this situation generates multiple problems in both immigrants and native population. In this work we suggest that new technology can alleviate these effects and we present specific tools and methodologies adopted by ANCE, in order to support online communities and specifically immigrant communities in Greece. This approach has the potential to support immigrant communities' in terms of the organization of personal data, communication, and provision of a working space for dedicated use. The Information System's operational features are also presented, along with other characteristics and state-of-the-art features in order to propose a general direction to the design of online communities' mechanisms.

Identifying key hospital service quality factors in online health communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Jung, Yuchul; Hur, Cinyoung; Jung, Dain; Kim, Minki

2015-04-07

The volume of health-related user-created content, especially hospital-related questions and answers in online health communities, has rapidly increased. Patients and caregivers participate in online community activities to share their experiences, exchange information, and ask about recommended or discredited hospitals. However, there is little research on how to identify hospital service quality automatically from the online communities. In the past, in-depth analysis of hospitals has used random sampling surveys. However, such surveys are becoming impractical owing to the rapidly increasing volume of online data and the diverse analysis requirements of related stakeholders. As a solution for utilizing large-scale health-related information, we propose a novel approach to identify hospital service quality factors and overtime trends automatically from online health communities, especially hospital-related questions and answers. We defined social media-based key quality factors for hospitals. In addition, we developed text mining techniques to detect such factors that frequently occur in online health communities. After detecting these factors that represent qualitative aspects of hospitals, we applied a sentiment analysis to recognize the types of recommendations in messages posted within online health communities. Korea's two biggest online portals were used to test the effectiveness of detection of social media-based key quality factors for hospitals. To evaluate the proposed text mining techniques, we performed manual evaluations on the extraction and classification results, such as hospital name, service quality factors, and recommendation types using a random sample of messages (ie, 5.44% (9450/173,748) of the total messages). Service quality factor detection and hospital name extraction achieved average F1 scores of 91% and 78%, respectively. In terms of recommendation classification, performance (ie, precision) is 78% on average. Extraction and

English Teachers "On-Line": Developing a New Community of Discourse.

Science.gov (United States)

Leach, Jenny

1997-01-01

Presents the case study of an online conference for students of English in a teacher education course. Argues electronic conferencing reveals the inadequacy of the concept of "reflective practitioner" to describe and analyze the complex process of teacher development. Demonstrates the social character of learning, highlighting the place…

Patient-Oriented Design of Online Support Communities

OpenAIRE

Krcmar, Helmut;Leimeister, Jan Marco

2014-01-01

This paper focuses on the process of designing and implementing an online support community for patients. After an introduction we describe a process for translating the socio-technical needs of cancer patients into system requirements as well as the development steps towards a functioning community platform for cancer patients. We combine a generic iterative process model for systems development with a prototyping approach towards an engineering process model for community platforms for canc...

The role of online community from user and firm perspective

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ponnamma Divakaran, Pradeep Kumar

for firm’s benefits. The overall objective of this doctoral dissertation is to provide insights about how online communities as a collective unit can be exploited for solving some of the problems faced by companies in their product development especially in their pre-launch period. This objective is built...... on the community itself and its characteristics, (2) research focussed on studying the off-line consumer or market behaviour using community as the field setting and (3) research focussed on investigating the various functions and roles of online communities as a collective unit. The first two studies...

Servant-Leadership: The Online Way! E-Learning Where Community Building Is Key

Science.gov (United States)

van de Bunt-Kokhuis, Sylvia; Sultan, Nabil

2012-01-01

The digitalisation of educational communities has increased rapidly in the last decade. Modern technologies transform the way educational leaders such as teachers, tutors, deans and supervisors view and manage their educational communities. More often, educational leaders offer a variety of gateways, guiding the e-learners in their search for…

Community College Students' Perceptions of Effective Communication in Online Learning

Science.gov (United States)

Parker, Donna Alice Hill

2012-01-01

This quantitative research project analyzed the application of instructional communication tools and techniques used by community college students to determine how they perceive communication in their online classes. Online students from a community college participated in this study by completing an electronic survey. Data analysis revealed that…

Incorporating profile information in community detection for online social networks

Science.gov (United States)

Fan, W.; Yeung, K. H.

2014-07-01

Community structure is an important feature in the study of complex networks. It is because nodes of the same community may have similar properties. In this paper we extend two popular community detection methods to partition online social networks. In our extended methods, the profile information of users is used for partitioning. We apply the extended methods in several sample networks of Facebook. Compared with the original methods, the community structures we obtain have higher modularity. Our results indicate that users' profile information is consistent with the community structure of their friendship network to some extent. To the best of our knowledge, this paper is the first to discuss how profile information can be used to improve community detection in online social networks.

Bereaved parents’ online grief communities: de-tabooing practices or relationbuilding grief-ghettos?

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Sandvik, Kjetil; Christensen, Dorthe Refslund; Hård af Segerstad, Ylva

their loss as well as their ability to establish and continue their role as parents. However, with new practices on children’s graves, the growing use of memory tattoos and especially the use of online media as platform for various communities for bereaved parents, this seem to be changing and strengthen...... both the interpersonal communication and social interactions about and with the deceased child. This study presents results from case studies of both open and closed online grief communities for bereaved parents in Denmark and Sweden (Refslund Christensen & Sandvik 2013, Hård af Segerstad & Kasperowski...... media, casting online communities for bereaved parents as grief-ghettos? Studying bereaved parents’ grief work in dynamic communities online enhances our understanding of contemporary and contributes to a nuancing of theoretical understanding of parental grief. References Christensen, D. R., & Sandvik...

Collective Emotions Online and Their Influence on Community Life

Science.gov (United States)

Chmiel, Anna; Sienkiewicz, Julian; Thelwall, Mike; Paltoglou, Georgios; Buckley, Kevan; Kappas, Arvid; Hołyst, Janusz A.

2011-01-01

Background E-communities, social groups interacting online, have recently become an object of interdisciplinary research. As with face-to-face meetings, Internet exchanges may not only include factual information but also emotional information – how participants feel about the subject discussed or other group members. Emotions in turn are known to be important in affecting interaction partners in offline communication in many ways. Could emotions in Internet exchanges affect others and systematically influence quantitative and qualitative aspects of the trajectory of e-communities? The development of automatic sentiment analysis has made large scale emotion detection and analysis possible using text messages collected from the web. However, it is not clear if emotions in e-communities primarily derive from individual group members' personalities or if they result from intra-group interactions, and whether they influence group activities. Methodology/Principal Findings Here, for the first time, we show the collective character of affective phenomena on a large scale as observed in four million posts downloaded from Blogs, Digg and BBC forums. To test whether the emotions of a community member may influence the emotions of others, posts were grouped into clusters of messages with similar emotional valences. The frequency of long clusters was much higher than it would be if emotions occurred at random. Distributions for cluster lengths can be explained by preferential processes because conditional probabilities for consecutive messages grow as a power law with cluster length. For BBC forum threads, average discussion lengths were higher for larger values of absolute average emotional valence in the first ten comments and the average amount of emotion in messages fell during discussions. Conclusions/Significance Overall, our results prove that collective emotional states can be created and modulated via Internet communication and that emotional expressiveness is the

Ill Literates or Illiterates? Investigating the eHealth Literacy of Users of Online Health Communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Petrič, Gregor; Atanasova, Sara; Kamin, Tanja

2017-10-04

Electronic health (eHealth) literacy is an important skill that allows patients to navigate intelligibly through the vast, often misleading Web-based world. Although eHealth literacy has been investigated in general and specific demographic populations, it has not yet been analyzed on users of online health communities (OHCs). Evidence shows that OHCs are important Web 2.0 applications for patients for managing their health, but at the same time, warnings have been expressed regarding the quality and relevance of shared information. No studies exist that investigate levels of eHealth literacy among users of OHCs and differences in eHealth literacy between different types of users. The study aimed to investigate eHealth literacy across different types of users of OHCs based on a revised and extended eHealth literacy scale (eHEALS). The study was based on a cross-sectional Web survey on a simple random sample of 15,000 registered users of the most popular general OHC in Slovenia. The final sample comprised 644 users of the studied OHC. An extended eHEALS (eHEALS-E) was tested with factor analytical procedures, whereas user types were identified with a hierarchical clustering algorithm. The research question was analyzed with analysis of variance (ANOVA) procedure and pairwise comparison tests. Factor analysis of the revised and extended eHEALS revealed six dimensions: awareness of sources, recognizing quality and meaning, understanding information, perceived efficiency, validating information, and being smart on the Net. The factor solution demonstrates a good fit to the data (root mean square error of approximation [RMSEA]=.059). The most developed dimension of eHEALS-E is awareness of different Internet sources (mean=3.98, standard deviation [SD]=0.61), whereas the least developed is understanding information (mean=3.11, SD=0.75). Clustering resulted in four user types: active help-seekers (48.3%, 311/644), lurkers (31.8%, 205/644), core relational users (16

Ethnomethodology and the study of online communities

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

1998-01-01

Full Text Available Drawing from the authors’ current research programs, this essay explores the basic dimensions of online communities and the concomitant need for scholars to rethink the assumptions that undergrid historic paradigms about the nature of social interaction, social bonding, and empirical experience (Cerulo, 1997. In so doing, we argue that online communities are far from the “imagined” or pseudo communities explicated by Calhoun (1991; that they are, in fact, “real” in the very way in which they reflect the changing nature of human relations and human interaction. Finally this paper discusses the epistemological and methodological implications of studying cyber communities. We will discuss how computer-mediated interaction, or telelogic communication, as it has been characterized by a number of theorists (Ogan, 1993; Ball-Rokeach & Reardon, 1988, can be analyzed to contribute to phenomenological or ethnographic understandings of what it means to be a member of a cyber-community. We suggest that one of the best approaches to taking such a phenomenological snapshot is through a multi-method triangulation, employing qualitative interviews and descriptive and inferential analyses of message content. We also will address limitations and restrictions for using the Internet to do ethnomethodology.

Social support and responsiveness in online patient communities: impact on service quality perceptions.

Science.gov (United States)

Nambisan, Priya; Gustafson, David H; Hawkins, Robert; Pingree, Suzanne

2016-02-01

Hospitals frequently evaluate their service quality based on the care and services provided to patients by their clinical and non-clinical staff.(1,2) However, such evaluations do not take into consideration the many interactions that patients have in online patient communities with the health-care organization (HCO) as well as with peer patients. Patients' interactions in these online communities could impact their perceptions regarding the HCO's service quality. The objective of this pilot study was to evaluate the impact of social support and responsiveness that patients experience in an HCO's online community on patients' perceptions regarding the HCO's service quality. The study data are collected from CHESS, a health-care programme (Comprehensive Health Enhancement Support System) run by the Centre for Health Enhancement System Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Findings show that the social support and the responsiveness received from peer patients in the online patient communities will impact patients' perceptions regarding the service quality of the HCO even when the organizational members themselves do not participate in the online discussions. The results indicate that interactions in such HCO-provided online patient communities should not be ignored as they could translate into patients' perceptions regarding HCOs' service quality. Ways to improve responsiveness and social support in an HCO's online patient community are discussed. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

The Search Conference as a Method in Planning Community Health Promotion Actions

Science.gov (United States)

Magnus, Eva; Knudtsen, Margunn Skjei; Wist, Guri; Weiss, Daniel; Lillefjell, Monica

2016-01-01

Aims: The aim of this article is to describe and discuss how the search conference can be used as a method for planning health promotion actions in local communities. Design and methods: The article draws on experiences with using the method for an innovative project in health promotion in three Norwegian municipalities. The method is described both in general and how it was specifically adopted for the project. Results and conclusions: The search conference as a method was used to develop evidence-based health promotion action plans. With its use of both bottom-up and top-down approaches, this method is a relevant strategy for involving a community in the planning stages of health promotion actions in line with political expectations of participation, ownership, and evidence-based initiatives. Significance for public health This article describe and discuss how the Search conference can be used as a method when working with knowledge based health promotion actions in local communities. The article describe the sequences of the conference and shows how this have been adapted when planning and prioritizing health promotion actions in three Norwegian municipalities. The significance of the article is that it shows how central elements in the planning of health promotion actions, as participation and involvements as well as evidence was a fundamental thinking in how the conference were accomplished. The article continue discussing how the method function as both a top-down and a bottom-up strategy, and in what way working evidence based can be in conflict with a bottom-up strategy. The experiences described can be used as guidance planning knowledge based health promotion actions in communities. PMID:27747199

Categorizing behavior in online communities: a look into the world of cake bakers

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Ganley, D.; Moser, C.; Groenewegen, P.

2012-01-01

In this article, we examine the patterns of behavior of online community members. We develop a list of measurable markers of behavior, drawing on online behavior and social network literature, and show how to construct the markers from the hidden relationship data in online communities. We then

Patient Continued Use of Online Health Care Communities: Web Mining of Patient-Doctor Communication.

Science.gov (United States)

Wu, Bing

2018-04-16

In practice, online health communities have passed the adoption stage and reached the diffusion phase of development. In this phase, patients equipped with knowledge regarding the issues involved in health care are capable of switching between different communities to maximize their online health community activities. Online health communities employ doctors to answer patient questions, and high quality online health communities are more likely to be acknowledged by patients. Therefore, the factors that motivate patients to maintain ongoing relationships with online health communities must be addressed. However, this has received limited scholarly attention. The purpose of this study was to identify the factors that drive patients to continue their use of online health communities where doctor-patient communication occurs. This was achieved by integrating the information system success model with online health community features. A Web spider was used to download and extract data from one of the most authoritative Chinese online health communities in which communication occurs between doctors and patients. The time span analyzed in this study was from January 2017 to March 2017. A sample of 469 valid anonymous patients with 9667 posts was obtained (the equivalent of 469 respondents in survey research). A combination of Web mining and structural equation modeling was then conducted to test the research hypotheses. The results show that the research framework for integrating the information system success model and online health community features contributes to our understanding of the factors that drive patients' relationships with online health communities. The primary findings are as follows: (1) perceived usefulness is found to be significantly determined by three exogenous variables (ie, social support, information quality, and service quality; R 2 =0.88). These variables explain 87.6% of the variance in perceived usefulness of online health communities; (2

How Social Communications Influence Advertising Perception and Response in Online Communities?

Science.gov (United States)

Zeng, Fue; Tao, Ran; Yang, Yanwu; Xie, Tingting

2017-01-01

This research aims to explore how social communications of online communities affect users' perception and responses toward social media advertising. We developed a conceptual model based on the SBT, encapsulating 9 constructs and 10 hypothesis extracted from the extant social media advertising literature. Our research outcome proves that social communications can effectively boost users' behaviors to be in accordance with an online social community, thus facilitate their acceptance and responses toward social media advertising, with users' group intention as an intervening factor. From an operational standpoint, it's an effective way to build and maintain social bonds between users and the community by boosting social communications, supporting fluent interpersonal communications. In addition, managers of an online community should elaborate on users' group intentions to increase users' advertising acceptance and response.

How Social Communications Influence Advertising Perception and Response in Online Communities?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Fue Zeng

2017-08-01

Full Text Available This research aims to explore how social communications of online communities affect users’ perception and responses toward social media advertising. We developed a conceptual model based on the SBT, encapsulating 9 constructs and 10 hypothesis extracted from the extant social media advertising literature. Our research outcome proves that social communications can effectively boost users’ behaviors to be in accordance with an online social community, thus facilitate their acceptance and responses toward social media advertising, with users’ group intention as an intervening factor. From an operational standpoint, it’s an effective way to build and maintain social bonds between users and the community by boosting social communications, supporting fluent interpersonal communications. In addition, managers of an online community should elaborate on users’ group intentions to increase users’ advertising acceptance and response.

How Social Communications Influence Advertising Perception and Response in Online Communities?

Science.gov (United States)

Zeng, Fue; Tao, Ran; Yang, Yanwu; Xie, Tingting

2017-01-01

This research aims to explore how social communications of online communities affect users’ perception and responses toward social media advertising. We developed a conceptual model based on the SBT, encapsulating 9 constructs and 10 hypothesis extracted from the extant social media advertising literature. Our research outcome proves that social communications can effectively boost users’ behaviors to be in accordance with an online social community, thus facilitate their acceptance and responses toward social media advertising, with users’ group intention as an intervening factor. From an operational standpoint, it’s an effective way to build and maintain social bonds between users and the community by boosting social communications, supporting fluent interpersonal communications. In addition, managers of an online community should elaborate on users’ group intentions to increase users’ advertising acceptance and response. PMID:28855879

Negative Perceptions of Urban Tourism Community in Beijing: Based on Online Comments

OpenAIRE

Ping, Li; Kaiyong, Wang; Tian, Chen; Fuyuan, Wang

2017-01-01

The development of urban tourism community (UTC) will bring new vigor and vitality into the urban sustainable development. There are abundant tourists’ comments about personal experience in UTC in online travel communities, which provide good access to the knowledge of negative perceptions of urban tourism community. Based on online comments, this paper used content analysis method to research tourists’ negative perceptions about five typical tourism communities in Beijing, whereby the common...

Creating a Community of Inquiry in Online Library Instruction

Science.gov (United States)

Rapchak, Marcia E.

2017-01-01

According to the Community of Inquiry (CoI) model (Garrison, Anderson, & Archer, 2000), an enriching educational experience online in a collaborative learning environment requires three interdependent elements: social presence, teaching presence, and cognitive presence. Social presence provides interaction in the online environment that allows…

Classification Schedules as Subject Enhancement in Online Catalogs. A Review of a Conference Sponsored by Forest Press, the OCLC Online Computer Library Center, and the Council on Library Resources.

Science.gov (United States)

Mandel, Carol A.

This paper presents a synthesis of the ideas and issues developed at a conference convened to review the results of the Dewey Decimal Classification Online Project and explore the potential for future use of the Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC) and Library of Congress Classification (LCC) schedules in online library catalogs. Conference…

Greeting You Online: Selecting Web-Based Conferencing Tools for Instruction in E-Learning Mode

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Judy

2014-01-01

Academic distance learning programs have gained popularity and added to the demand for online library services. Librarians are now conducting instruction for distance learning students beyond their traditional work. Technology advancements have enhanced the delivery mode in distance learning across academic disciplines. Online conference tools…

E-Service Quality, E-Satisfaction and E-Loyalty of Online Shoppers in Business to Consumer Market; Evidence form Malaysia

Science.gov (United States)

Ting, Ong Soo; Ariff, Mohd Shoki Md; Zakuan, Norhayati; Sulaiman, Zuraidah; Zameri Mat Saman, Muhamad

2016-05-01

The growing usage of internet and online shopping in Malaysia presents a huge prospect in e-commerce market, specifically for B2C segment. As a result, electronic service quality (e-SQ), electronic satisfaction (e-Satisfaction) and electronic loyalty (e-Loyalty) become vital for online retailers to attract and retain online shoppers in this virtual environment. The association between e-SQ, e-Satisfaction and e-Loyalty should be continuously examined to cope with the advancement in information and communication technology, and the changing expectation of online shoppers. However, construct of e-SQ for online retailers in B2C market is still debatable. In this research, E-SERVQUAL was integrated with the other e-SQ scales to measure e-SQ of a prominent online retailer in Malaysia. Specifically, the e-SQ constructs are Efficiency, Privacy and Trust, Fulfilment, Responsiveness, Contact and Website Design. 390 sets of completed and usable questionnaires were gathered using online questionnaire and convenience sampling procedure. The result indicated that the five proposed dimensions of e-SQ constitute e-SQ of online retailer in B2C market. All the dimensions of e-SQ were found to have positive and significant effect on e-Satisfaction of online shoppers. Responsiveness of e-SQ had the strongest impact on e-satisfaction of online shoppers. The shoppers e-Satisfaction was positively and significantly affected their e-Loyalty towards continuous usage of online retailer's website. Managerial and theoretical implications are discussed based on the results of the study.

Time for Decisions: Visualizing the Future. Proceedings of the Annual NEAIR Conference (39th, Bethesda, Maryland, November 3-6, 2012)

Science.gov (United States)

Carson, Cristi, Ed.

2012-01-01

The NEAIR (North East Association for Institutional Research) 2012 Conference Proceedings is a compilation of papers presented at the Bethesda, Maryland conference. Papers in this document include: (1) Can a Marketing Campaign Increase Response Rates to Online Course Evaluations? (Kimberly Puhala); (2) Developing Community College Peer…

Assessing the Overall Value of an Online Writing Community

Science.gov (United States)

Mohapatra, Sanjay; Mohanty, Sukriti

2017-01-01

The advent of internet has brought in changes to many existing stable business models. With the technological shift, the concept of community writing has undergone several changes. Using a sample of 181 participants, it was found that online community, of late, has been greatly impacted by technology. Community writing involves amalgamation of…

Developing leadership practices in hospital-based nurse educators in an online learning community.

Science.gov (United States)

Stutsky, Brenda J; Spence Laschinger, Heather K

2014-01-01

Hospital-based nurse educators are in a prime position to mentor future nurse leaders; however, they need to first develop their own leadership practices. The goal was to establish a learning community where hospital-based nurse educators could develop their own nursing leadership practices within an online environment that included teaching, cognitive, and social presence. Using a pretest/posttest-only nonexperimental design, 35 nurse educators from three Canadian provinces engaged in a 12-week online learning community via a wiki where they learned about exemplary leadership practices and then shared stories about their own leadership practices. Nurse educators significantly increased their own perceived leadership practices after participation in the online community, and teaching, cognitive, and social presence was determined to be present in the online community. It was concluded that leadership development can be enhanced in an online learning community using a structured curriculum, multimedia presentations, and the sharing and analysis of leadership stories. Educators who participated should now be better equipped to role model exemplary leadership practices and mentor our nurse leaders of the future.

Open source learning streams in online discussions in e-learning

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kjærgaard, Thomas; Sorensen, Elsebeth Korsgaard

2014-01-01

The wish for a more engaging e-learning design and better utilization of the technology at hand has led to the pedagogic design in this study. We wanted to make a strong alternative to face-to-face teaching that was just as likely to facilitate learning as face to face teacher presentations...... and class discussions. The study investigates how online discussions in connection with teacher produced video presentations can generate an ‘open source learning stream’ in an e-learning course for teachers. We look at how an ‘open source learning stream’ can encourage students to give and receive peer...... feedback. We propose the idea that if learning in an online community is set up to follow the lines of identity building in social media (Larsen 2007) then we might get a natural momentum in the ‘open source learning stream’. We try to identify demographic factors that could influence the success...

Online community source of new knowledge, practices for Africa's ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

29 avr. 2016 ... The online network connects rural broadcasters to their peers and to a wealth of useful resources and information. The broadcasters can then package and relay that information through their own programming. Barza3.png. Officially launched in November 2011, the Barza online community now more than ...

Partnered Evaluation of a Community Engagement Intervention: Use of a “Kickoff” Conference in a Randomized Trial for Depression Care Improvement in Underserved Communities

Science.gov (United States)

Mendel, Peter; Ngo, Victoria K.; Dixon, Elizabeth; Stockdale, Susan; Jones, Felica; Chung, Bowen; Jones, Andrea; Masongsong, Zoe; Khodyakov, Dmitry

2013-01-01

Community partnered research and engagement strategies are gaining recognition as innovative approaches to improving healthcare systems and reducing health disparities in underserved communities. These strategies may have particular relevance for mental health interventions in low income, minority communities in which there often is great stigma and silence surrounding conditions such as depression and difficulty in implementing improved access and quality of care. At the same time, there is a relative dearth of evidence on the effectiveness of specific community engagement interventions and on the design, process, and context of these interventions necessary for understanding their implementation and generalizability. This paper evaluates one of a number of community engagement strategies employed in the Community Partners in Care (CPIC) study, the first randomized controlled trial of the role of community engagement in adapting and implementing evidence-based depression care. We specifically describe the unique goals and features of a community engagement “kickoff” conference as used in CPIC and provide evidence on the effectiveness of this type of intervention by analyzing its impact on: 1) stimulating a dialogue, sense of collective efficacy, and opportunities for learning and networking to address depression and depression care in the community, 2) activating interest and participation in CPIC’s randomized trial of two different ways to implement evidence-based quality improvement (QI) programs for depression across diverse community agencies, and 3) introducing evidence-based toolkits and collaborative care models to potential participants in both intervention conditions and other community members. We evaluated the effectiveness of the conference through a community-partnered process in which both community and academic project members were involved in study design, data collection and analysis. Data sources include participant conference evaluation

EDITORIAL: International MEMS Conference 2006

Science.gov (United States)

Tay, Francis E. H.; Jianmin, Miao; Iliescu, Ciprian

2006-04-01

The International MEMS conference (iMEMS2006) organized by the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology and Nanyang Technological University aims to provide a platform for academicians, professionals and industrialists in various related fields from all over the world to share and learn from each other. Of great interest is the incorporation of the theme of life sciences application using MEMS. It is the desire of this conference to initiate collaboration and form network of cooperation. This has continued to be the objective of iMEMS since its inception in 1997. The technological advance of MEMS over the past few decades has been truly exciting in terms of development and applications. In order to participate in this rapid development, a conference involving delegates from within the MEMS community and outside the community is very meaningful and timely. With the receipt of over 200 articles, delegates related to MEMS field from all over the world will share their perspectives on topics such as MEMS/MST Design, MEMS Teaching and Education, MEMS/MST Packaging, MEMS/MST Fabrication, Microsystems Applications, System Integration, Wearable Devices, MEMSWear and BioMEMS. Invited speakers and delegates from outside the field have also been involved to provide challenges, especially in the life sciences field, for the MEMS community to potentially address. The proceedings of the conference will be published as an issue in the online Journal of Physics: Conference Series and this can reach a wider audience and will facilitate the reference and citation of the work presented in the conference. We wish to express our deep gratitude to the International Scientific Committee members and the organizing committee members for contributing to the success of this conference. We would like to thank all the delegates, speakers and sponsors from all over the world for presenting and sharing their perspectives on topics related to MEMS and the challenges that MEMS can

Anonymity versus privacy: Selective information sharing in online cancer communities

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Frost, J.H.; Vermeulen, I.E.; Beekers, N.

2014-01-01

Background: Active sharing in online cancer communities benefits patients. However, many patients refrain from sharing health information online due to privacy concerns. Existing research on privacy emphasizes data security and confidentiality, largely focusing on electronic medical records. Patient

O papel do community manager Toluna SAS: comunidade online interativa

OpenAIRE

Faria, Filipa Maria Ferreira Prego de

2014-01-01

Atualmente, a maioria das empresas encontra-se ligada a uma das ferramentas mais poderosas do mundo: a internet. Com o crescimento deste fenómeno, surgem aplicativos para melhorarem o seu aproveitamento. As empresas começam a usufruir da Web 2.0, que visa a utilização da internet como uma plataforma social. O trabalho aqui apresentado pretende fazer uma análise profunda da empresa online Toluna SAS e explicar o surgimento do profissional responsável por essa plataforma social, o Community Man...

Motivation and Self-Regulation in Community College Transfer Students at a Four-Year Online University

Science.gov (United States)

List, Alexandra; Nadasen, Denise

2017-01-01

Motivation and self-regulation were examined in a sample of community college transfer students enrolled in a 4-year, online university. The relation between motivation and self-regulation and students' performance was examined, as was the association between these learner characteristics (i.e., motivation and self-regulation) and sociodemographic…

The danger of engagement: Behavioral observations of online community activity and service spending in the online gaming

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Kaptein, M.C.; Parvinen, P.; Pöyri, E.

2015-01-01

Research indicates that customer engagement in online communities has positive effects on related businesses, and that, on an aggregated level, community activity and service spending are positively related. Therefore, marketing efforts tend to focus on promoting the community activity of customers.

Influencing consumer engagement in online customer communities: The role of interactivity

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mercy Mpinganjira

2016-08-01

Originality and value of research: Little research exists on consumer engagement, resulting in limited understanding of the concept as well as its antecedents. Focusing on online customer communities, this article contributes to addressing this gap in literature. Managers of online customer communities can use the findings to monitor levels of consumer engagement on their sites and find ways of enhancing it.

Online extremism and the communities that sustain it: Detecting the ISIS supporting community on Twitter

Science.gov (United States)

Joseph, Kenneth; Carley, Kathleen M.

2017-01-01

The Islamic State of Iraq and ash-Sham (ISIS) continues to use social media as an essential element of its campaign to motivate support. On Twitter, ISIS’ unique ability to leverage unaffiliated sympathizers that simply retweet propaganda has been identified as a primary mechanism in their success in motivating both recruitment and “lone wolf” attacks. The present work explores a large community of Twitter users whose activity supports ISIS propaganda diffusion in varying degrees. Within this ISIS supporting community, we observe a diverse range of actor types, including fighters, propagandists, recruiters, religious scholars, and unaffiliated sympathizers. The interaction between these users offers unique insight into the people and narratives critical to ISIS’ sustainment. In their entirety, we refer to this diverse set of users as an online extremist community or OEC. We present Iterative Vertex Clustering and Classification (IVCC), a scalable analytic approach for OEC detection in annotated heterogeneous networks, and provide an illustrative case study of an online community of over 22,000 Twitter users whose online behavior directly advocates support for ISIS or contibutes to the group’s propaganda dissemination through retweets. PMID:29194446

Preparing Educators for Online Writing Instruction: Principles and Processes

Science.gov (United States)

Hewett, Beth L.; Ehmann, Christa

2004-01-01

This book offers a theoretical justification for online writing instruction (OWI) and a fully developed approach to training educators for such instruction--whether in networked classrooms, distance learning, e-mail- or Internet-based conferences, or online tutoring. The book includes concrete examples of asynchronous (non-real-time) and…

"The Next Level": Investigating Teaching and Learning within an Irish Traditional Music Online Community

Science.gov (United States)

Kenny, Ailbhe

2013-01-01

Online music communities offer a new context and culture for musical participation globally. This article, employing a socio-cultural theoretical lens, examines how the Online Academy of Irish Music (OAIM) functions as a teaching and learning online community for Irish traditional music. Findings from qualitative case study research present…

Proceedings of the Spanish Conference on e-Science Grid Computing. March 1-2, 2007. Madrid (Spain)

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Casado, J.; Mayo, R.; Munoz, R.

2007-01-01

The Spanish Conference on e-Science Grid Computing and the EGEE-EELA Industrial Day (http://webrt.ciemat.es:8000/e-science/index.html) are the first edition of this open forum for the integration of Grid Technologies and its applications in the Spanish community. It has been organised by CIEMAT and CETA-CIEMAT, sponsored by IBM and HP and supported by the European Community through their funded projects EELA, EUChinaGrid and EUMedGrid. To all of them, the conference is very grateful. e-Science is the concept that defines those activities developed by using geographically distributed resources, which scientists (or whoever) can access through the Internet. However, commercial Internet does not fulfil resources such as calculus and massive storage -most frequently in demand in the field of e-Science- since they require high-speed networks devoted to research. These networks, alongside the collaborative work applications developed within them, are creating an ideal scenario for interaction among researchers. Thus, this technology that interconnects a huge variety of computers, information repositories, applications software and scientific tools will change the society in the next few years. The science, industry and services systems will benefit from his immense capacity of computation that will improve the quality of life and the well-being of citizens. The future generation of technologies, which will reach all of these areas in society, such as research, medicine, engineering, economy and entertainment will be based on integrated computers and networks, rendering a very high quality of services and applications through a friendly interface. The conference aims at becoming a liaison framework between Spanish and International developers and users of e-Science applications and at implementing these technologies in Spain. It intends to be a forum where the state of the art of different European projects on e- Science is shown, as well as developments in the research

Compliance or patient empowerment in online communities

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Wentzer, Helle; Bygholm, Ann

2010-01-01

New technologies enable a different organization of the public’s admission to health care services. The article discusses whether online support groups in patient treatment are to be understood in the light of patient empowerment or within the tradition of compliance. The back-ground material...... of opening up health care to the critical voice of the public, the quantitative and qualitative studies surprisingly point to a synthesis of the otherwise opposite positions of empowerment and compliance in patient care. Thereby the critical potential of online communities in health care services seems...

Determinants of Success for Online Communities: An Analysis of Three Communities in Terms of Members' Perceived Professional Development

Science.gov (United States)

Hew, Khe Foon

2009-01-01

Recent empirical evidence suggests that the updated DeLone and McLean's information systems (D&M IS) model can identify the determinants of success of online communities in terms of member loyalty (Lin and Lee 2006). This study is similarly concerned with the challenge of identifying the determinants of success of online communities, but it…

Student Perceptions of a Successful Online Collaborative Learning Community

Science.gov (United States)

Waugh, Michael L.; Su, Jian

2016-01-01

This paper shares the perceptions of a group of 11 successful online students regarding the value of the collaborative learning community that developed as part of their participation in the first cohort of the WebIT online Master of Science Degree in Instructional Technology program, at The University of Tennessee at Knoxville during 2008-2010.…

Mentoring Alternative Certification Teachers: Implementing an Online Collaborative Consultation Community

Science.gov (United States)

Dukes, Lyman, III; Jones, Brett D.

2007-01-01

Online discussion boards have the potential to provide significant support to beginning teachers; thus, we designed an online collaborative consultation community to provide mentor support to university students enrolled in an alternative certification program. The results suggest that although students in alternative certification programs will…

Benefits of peer support in online Japanese breast cancer communities: differences between lurkers and posters.

Science.gov (United States)

Setoyama, Yoko; Yamazaki, Yoshihiko; Namayama, Kazuhiro

2011-12-29

Web 2.0 has improved interactions among peers on the Internet, especially for the many online patient communities that have emerged over the past decades. Online communities are said to be particularly beneficial peer support resources for patients with breast cancer. However, most studies of online patient communities have focused on those members who post actively (posters), even though there are many members who participate without posting (lurkers). In addition, little attention has been paid to the usage of online communities among non-English-speaking patients. The present study explored the differences in peer support received by lurkers and posters in online breast cancer communities. It also examined the effects of such support on both groups' mental health. We conducted an exploratory, descriptive, cross-sectional, Web-based survey among members of four Japanese online breast cancer communities. In an online questionnaire, we asked questions regarding sociodemographics, disease-related characteristics, mental health, participation in online communities, and peer support received from those communities. Of the 465 people who accessed the questionnaire, 253 completed it. Of the respondents, 113/220 (51.4%) were lurkers. There was no significant difference between lurkers and posters with regard to sociodemographic variables. About half of the posters had been given a diagnosis of breast cancer less than a year previously, which was a significantly shorter period than that of the lurkers (P = .02). The 5 support functions extracted by factor analysis were the same for both posters and lurkers. These were emotional support/helper therapy, emotional expression, conflict, advice, and insight/universality. When the support scores were calculated, insight/universality scored highest for both posters and lurkers, with scores that were not significantly different between the two groups. Among the 5 support scores, emotional support/helper therapy and emotional

Community Colleges and Underappreciated Assets: Using Institutional Data to Promote Success in Online Learning

Science.gov (United States)

Hachey, Alyse; Conway, Katherine; Wladis, Claire

2013-01-01

Adapting to the 21st century, community colleges are not adding brick and mortar to meet enrollment demands. Instead, they are expanding services through online learning, with at least 61% of all community college students taking online courses today (Pearson, 2011). As online learning is affording alternate pathways to education for students, it…

Einstein girls: Exploring STEM careers, interest, and identity in an online mentoring community

Science.gov (United States)

Scott, Jill Rice

The purpose of this project was to create and study an online mentoring community that connected fifth and sixth grade girls and female STEM mentors. The project was designed to give girls who were interested in science the chance to communicate online with women who were successful STEM professionals. The community provided the girls a venue to ask the women questions about their careers, their interests, and their science identities. Through this venue the girls were able to explore various STEM careers, be exposed to role models, and potentially increase their interest in science for the future. Mentoring has been shown to have a positive impact on girls and help improve their attitudes toward science and interests in STEM. The project examined the nature of the online mentoring process as well as the participants' perceptions of the opportunities and constraints of the community. The girls were members of an afterschool academy and the mentoring took place through the Internet using a secure educational social networking program. The program spanned a four-week period between April and May 2013. The main purpose of this study was formative since online mentoring is a relatively new area of research. This investigation produced detailed accounts of activities between the girls and the mentors. Findings revealed that the participants approached the community uniquely and explored many aspects of career exploration, STEM interest, and science identity. The participants also identified what they perceived as the opportunities afforded by the community as well as the constraints posed by the community. The research represented by this study was practitioner research with the work connecting theory with practice. The knowledge gained through the intentional reflection on and study of the Einstein Girls online mentoring community was useful in the production of knowledge that is transformative for the researcher's professional practice and transferable to other

Learning Online at Rio Hondo Community College.

Science.gov (United States)

Balch, David E.; Patino, I. F.

1999-01-01

Recounts Rio Hondo Community College's decision to "go online" in anticipation of reduced funding, needed expansion, increased inservice training, changing student demographics, and the movement into computer technology. Summarizes the changes faced by the college and discusses how its Public Service Department involved administrators…

How Consumers Persuade Each Other: Rhetorical Strategies of Interpersonal Influence in Online Communities

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Daiane Scaraboto

2012-07-01

Full Text Available Persuasive messages are central to interpersonal influence in online communities, where consumers interact mainly through text. We employed a combination of netnography and computer-mediated discourse analysis to investigate how consumers exchange information related to products and brands in an online community. We identified a set of rhetorical strategies used by community members, including setting expectations, claiming expertise, prescribing, and celebrating acquiescence. Consumers employ these rhetorical strategies to influence each other's consumption decisions, report consumption decisions back to the community, and to gauge their influence on each other's choices. We compare this process to traditional types of interpersonal influence and discuss how our findings contribute to advancing the burgeoning literature on interpersonal influence in online contexts.

Collective Value Creation and Empowerment in an Online Brand Community: A Netnographic Study on LEGO Builders

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Pekka Tuominen

2012-06-01

Full Text Available Online communities are becoming “places” of belonging, information, and emotional support that people cannot do without. These social groups have a real existence for their participants, and thus have consequential effects on many aspects of behaviour. This article examines collective value creation and empowerment in an online brand community. It presents the main features of an online brand community, the process of value co-creation, and motivators for participating in online brand communities. These key factors jointly characterize collective value creation and empowerment. This netnographic study focuses on an online brand community called BrickBuilders, which is a meeting place for LEGO builders in Finland. BrickBuilders’ members feel a sense of belonging, they share similar motivations, and they create value together.

Designing, Supporting, and Sustaining an Online Community of Practice: NASA EPO Workspace as an Ongoing Exploration of the Value of Community

Science.gov (United States)

Davey, B.; Davis, H. B.

2015-12-01

Increasingly, geographically diverse organizations, like NASA's Science Mission Directorate Education and Public Outreach personnel (SMD EPO), are looking for ways to facilitate group interactions in meaningful ways while limiting costs. Towards this end, of particular interest, and showing great potential are communities of practice. Communities of practice represent relationships in real-time between and among people sharing a common practice. They facilitate the sharing of information, building collective knowledge, and growing of the principles of practice. In 2010-11, SMD EPO established a website to support EPO professionals, facilitate headquarters reporting, and foster a community of practice. The purpose of this evaluation is to examine the design and use of the workspace and the value created for both individual community members and SMD EPO, the sponsoring organization. The online workspace was launched in 2010-11 for the members of NASA's SMDEPO community. The online workspace was designed to help facilitate the efficient sharing of information, be a central repository for resources, help facilitate and support knowledge creation, and ultimately lead to the development of an online community of practice. This study examines the role of the online workspace component of a community in the work of a community of practice. Much has been studied revealing the importance of communities of practice to organizations, project success, and knowledge management and some of these same successes hold true for virtual communities of practice. Additionally, we look at the outcomes of housting the online community for these past years in respect to knowledge building and personal and organizational value, the affects on professional dvelopment opportunities, how community members have benefited, and how the workspace has evolved to better serve the community.

Social networking online to recover from opioid use disorder: A study of community interactions.

Science.gov (United States)

D'Agostino, Alexandra R; Optican, Allison R; Sowles, Shaina J; Krauss, Melissa J; Escobar Lee, Kiriam; Cavazos-Rehg, Patricia A

2017-12-01

Social media has increasingly become a venue for health discourse and support, particularly for vulnerable individuals. This study examines user-generated content of an online Reddit community targeting individuals recovering from opiate addiction. 100 Reddit posts and their comments were collected from the online community on August 19, 2016. Posts were qualitatively coded for opioid use disorder (OUD) criteria as outlined by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), as well as other common themes. Comments were coded for expression of distinct therapeutic factors (i.e., instillation of hope, universality, imparting information, and altruism). All posts and comments were coded for addiction phase of the author (i.e., using, withdrawing, recovering). 73 unique usernames authored the 100 posts. Among the 73 usernames, 33% (24/73) described enough symptoms in their posts to meet DSM-V criteria for OUD (16/73 or 22% mild severity, 7/73 or 10% moderate severity, and 1/73 or 1% high severity. Among the 100 posts, advice was requested in 43% (43/100) of the posts and support was sought in 24% (24/100) of the posts. There were 511 comments made on the 100 posts, nearly all of which contained at least one distinct therapeutic factor (486/511, 95%) with altruism being the most common (341/511, 67%). This research provides validity to the supportive content generated on an online recovery-oriented community, while also revealing discussions of self-reported struggles with OUD among group members. Future research should explore the feasibility of incorporating social media-based peer support into traditional addiction treatments. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Finding the community in sustainable online community engagement: Not-for-profit organisation websites, service-learning and research

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alice Dodd

2017-06-01

Full Text Available This article explores the use of action research (2008–2014 based on a case study of the Sustainable Online Community Engagement (SOCE Project, a service-learning project in which University of South Australia students build websites for not-for-profit (NFP organisations, to demonstrate that effective teaching, public service and research are interdependent. A significant problem experienced in the SOCE project was that, despite some training and ongoing assistance, the community organisations reported that they found it difficult to make effective use of their websites. One of the proposed solutions was to develop an online community of the participating organisations that would be self-supporting, member-driven and collaborative, and enable the organisations to share information about web-based technology. The research reported here explored the usefulness of developing such an online community for the organisations involved and sought alternative ways to assist the organisations to maintain an effective and sustainable web presence. The research used a three-phase ethnographic action research approach. The first phase was a content analysis and review of the editing records of 135 organisational websites hosted by the SOCE project. The second phase was an online survey sent to 145 community organisation members responsible for the management of these websites, resulting in 48 responses. The third phase consisted of semi-structured, in-depth interviews with 18 of the website managers from 12 of these organisations. The research revealed the extent to which organisations were unable to manage their websites and found that the proposed solution of an online community would not be useful. More importantly, it suggested other useful strategies which have been implemented. In Furco’s (2010 model of the engaged campus, public engagement can be used to advance the public service, teaching and research components of higher education’s tripartite

LHC Olympics Workshop and String Phenomenology 2006 Conference

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

David Gross

2006-10-01

This is the final report of the organizers of the String Phenomenolgy program of which the LHC Olympics and the String Phenomenolgy conference were a part. In addition, it includes the list of talks from our website which comprise the online proceedings. The KITP no longer publishes conferences proceedings but rather makes recordings and visuals of all talks available on its website at www.kitp.ucsb.edu Program talks are available at http://online.kitp.ucsb.edu/online/strings06/ Conference talks are are at http://online.itp.ucsb.edu/online/strings_c06/ and LHC Olympics talks are at http://online.itp.ucsb.edu/online/lhco_c06/. These talks constitute the proceedings of these meetings.

Community of Inquiry and Video in Higher Education: Engaging Students Online

Science.gov (United States)

Conrad, Oliver

2015-01-01

The purpose of this literature review was to explore how video technology can be effectively used in an online classroom setting. The author found and cited online journals with information about the Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework. He further explored specific sources that could give readers an idea how online video technology can affect…

The Development of a Community Feeling Scale toward Online Distance Education Environments

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hale Ilgaz

2009-11-01

members and satisfaction about the group activities (Rovai, 2000. By increasing the numbers and qualities of interactions in distance education programs, the community feeling in online mediums can be improved.By this aim the scale, which was based on Rovai, Wighting and Lucking's (2004 study, validity and reliability analyzes has been executed. The scale has been developed by the data which were obtained from 571 of the freshmen of the Ankara University Distance Education Program of Completion of Undergraduate in Faculty of Theology in 2007-2008 terms. At the end of the analysis the scale has been finalized with 6 items under 2 factors. As a result, in order to determine the community feeling of the learners who were registered to online distance education environments, a scale has been developed with validity and reliability studies. It is founded that keeping interaction between students by various tools such as discussion boards, chat modules or e-mails is important about prevention of students from social isolation, not being a member of the group in online distance education environments. The students who are being in interaction with each others will be more willing to participate in learning activities and won‟t tend to drop out as a result of feeling of alienation. This situation will affect students‟ achievement and satisfaction in a positive way.

Implementing and evaluating e-communication to improve intersectoral cooperation between hospitals and local communities

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nicolaisen, Anne; Qvist, Peter

2015-01-01

services for the patient. The Region of Southern Denmark has implemented e-communication to improve the cooperation across health care sectors. Communities and hospitals in the Region of Southern Denmark agreed to comply to specified quality standards for the content and timeliness of information exchange...... these will be presented at the conference. Keywords: e-communication, cooperation across health care sectors, audit, evaluation, practice...

The danger of engagement : Behavioral observations of online community activity and service spending in the online gaming context

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Kaptein, M.C.; Parvinen, Petri; Poyry, Essi

2016-01-01

Research indicates that customer engagement in online communities has positive effects on related businesses, and that, on an aggregated level, community activity and service spending are positively related. Therefore, marketing efforts tend to focus on promoting the community activity of customers.

A pedagogical design pattern framework for sharing experiences and enhancing communities of practice within online and blended learning

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

May, Michael; Neutszky-Wulff, Chresteria; Rosthøj, Susanne

2016-01-01

for teachers at the University of Copenhagen a new and simpler pedagogical design pattern framework was developed for interfaculty sharing of experiences and enhancing communities of practice in relation to online and blended learning across the university. The framework of pedagogical design patterns were...... applied to describe the learning design in four online and blended learning courses within different academic disciplines: Classical Greek, Biostatistics, Environmental Management in Europe, and Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation. Future perspectives for using the framework for developing...... new E-learning patterns for online and blended learning courses are discussed....

Being an online celebrity: Norms and expectations of YouTube’s beauty community

OpenAIRE

García-Rapp, Florencia; Roca-Cuberes, Carles

2017-01-01

This paper is based on 22 months of online fieldwork examining YouTube’s beauty community, specifically the beauty guru Bubz, her uploaded content, and user comments. We aim to conceptualize central community-specific dynamics and practices, particularly those related to self-presentation and identity management and their affordances for legitimized online popularity. We explain how the guru’s successful online persona is based on a performative blend of relatable, down-to-earth values paired...

Book Review ~ E-Moderating: The Key to Teaching and Learning Online. Author: Gilly Salmon

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Reviewed by Dan Eastmond

2003-04-01

Full Text Available No one doubts that the Internet has permanently changed the face of higher education. One of the institutions to experiment, foster, and promote computer-conferencing from its inception through to current Web-based forms is the Open University of the United Kingdom (OU UK. From 1988, OU UK’s few online offerings have grown to over 160 Web-based courses in which over 100,000 students participate. Having been a student-participant in one of these early courses back in 1992, I read with intrigue Salmon’s description of this effort. I remember logging on from Syracuse, New York to the text-only online course with four e-moderators and 45 other participants scattered throughout the world – from Israel, Australia, Latin America, the United States, but mainly Great Britain. I recalled the frustration of trying to get connected to the conference at 1:00 a.m. with my 9600 baud modem, relying on a tech-savvy fellow graduate student to figure out the problems. What a thrill it was to upload and download messages to these threaded discussions located on a server hundreds of miles across the ocean, to ruminate throughout the day about the conversations I read there, and to return to the conference the next day to post my thoughts and to find responses to my contributions as our conversations unfolded.

Proceedings of the conference on computer codes and the linear accelerator community

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Cooper, R.K.

1990-07-01

The conference whose proceedings you are reading was envisioned as the second in a series, the first having been held in San Diego in January 1988. The intended participants were those people who are actively involved in writing and applying computer codes for the solution of problems related to the design and construction of linear accelerators. The first conference reviewed many of the codes both extant and under development. This second conference provided an opportunity to update the status of those codes, and to provide a forum in which emerging new 3D codes could be described and discussed. The afternoon poster session on the second day of the conference provided an opportunity for extended discussion. All in all, this conference was felt to be quite a useful interchange of ideas and developments in the field of 3D calculations, parallel computation, higher-order optics calculations, and code documentation and maintenance for the linear accelerator community. A third conference is planned

Proceedings of the conference on computer codes and the linear accelerator community

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Cooper, R.K. (comp.)

1990-07-01

The conference whose proceedings you are reading was envisioned as the second in a series, the first having been held in San Diego in January 1988. The intended participants were those people who are actively involved in writing and applying computer codes for the solution of problems related to the design and construction of linear accelerators. The first conference reviewed many of the codes both extant and under development. This second conference provided an opportunity to update the status of those codes, and to provide a forum in which emerging new 3D codes could be described and discussed. The afternoon poster session on the second day of the conference provided an opportunity for extended discussion. All in all, this conference was felt to be quite a useful interchange of ideas and developments in the field of 3D calculations, parallel computation, higher-order optics calculations, and code documentation and maintenance for the linear accelerator community. A third conference is planned.

The hidden moderator – Exploring the roles of tuo’er in intra-firm R&D online communities

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Li-Ying, Jason; Zhang, Zhinan; Long, Qing

knowledge sharing and innovation within intra-firm online R&D communities. Just like those in a market place, tuo’er in online knowledge shari ng communities also have a mandate to mislead other regular community members by creating a bandwagon effect. However, their intention to facilitate online knowledge...... for the effective use of online knowledge sharing communiti es by firms. An in-depth case study with multiple data sources is conducted in China in a longitudinal fashion....

Exploring value creative and value destructive practice through an online brand community: : The case of Starbucks.

OpenAIRE

Dia, Uzezi

2015-01-01

This paper explores value co-creation and value co-destruction with a focus on the social practices embedded in the online brand community “My Starbucks Idea (MSI).” The objectives of the research are accomplished through a detailed explanation of the study’s stages, starting with the Research design/Planning, and followed by the Community Entry (Entrée), Data collection, Limitations, and Ethical implications. Since the study is exploratory in character, the qualitative research strategy was ...

Using Scholarly Online Communities to Empower Students

Science.gov (United States)

Bach, Dorothe J.

2011-01-01

This article seeks to inspire humanities and social science faculty to explore ways of utilizing existing scholarly online communities to engage students in the process of academic inquiry. The author discusses her own experience using a discipline-specific listserv, shares successful assignments, examples of student postings and a grading rubric.…

Benefits of Peer Support in Online Japanese Breast Cancer Communities: Differences Between Lurkers and Posters

OpenAIRE

Setoyama, Yoko; Yamazaki, Yoshihiko; Namayama, Kazuhiro

2011-01-01

Background Web 2.0 has improved interactions among peers on the Internet, especially for the many online patient communities that have emerged over the past decades. Online communities are said to be particularly beneficial peer support resources for patients with breast cancer. However, most studies of online patient communities have focused on those members who post actively (posters), even though there are many members who participate without posting (lurkers). In addition, little attentio...

Online Banking on E-Commerce in India

OpenAIRE

Navpreet Kaur; Dr. Ashutosh Pathak

2015-01-01

Online Banking is becoming an important aspect of worldwide commerce. Online Banking is also known as ebanking, cyber banking, virtual banking, net banking, and internet banking. Online banking includes various banking activities conducted from home business, instead of at a physical bank location Customer relationship management worked as a tool increased use of e-commerce makes CRM. Online banking is based on internet or web- based interaction to create a high volatile relations...

Views of Community Managers on Knowledge Co-creation in Online Communities for People With Disabilities: Qualitative Study.

Science.gov (United States)

Amann, Julia; Rubinelli, Sara

2017-10-10

The use of online communities to promote end user involvement and co-creation in the product and service innovation process is well documented in the marketing and management literature. Whereas online communities are widely used for health care service provision and peer-to-peer support, only little is known about how they could be integrated into the health care innovation process. The overall objective of this qualitative study was to explore community managers' views on and experiences with knowledge co-creation in online communities for people with disabilities. A descriptive qualitative research design was used. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with nine community managers. To complement the interview data, additional information was retrieved from the communities in the form of structural information (number of registered users, number and names of topic areas covered by the forum) and administrative information (terms and conditions and privacy statements, forum rules). Data were analyzed using thematic analysis. Our results highlight two main aspects: peer-to-peer knowledge co-creation and types of collaboration with external actors. Although community managers strongly encouraged peer-to-peer knowledge co-creation, our findings indicated that these activities were not common practice in the communities under investigation. In fact, much of what related to co-creation, prototyping, and product development was still perceived to be directed by professionals and experts. Community managers described the role of their respective communities as informing this process rather than a driving force. The role of community members as advisors to researchers, health care professionals, and businesses was discussed in the context of types of collaboration with external actors. According to the community managers, most of the external inquiries related to research projects of students or health care professionals in training, who often joined a

Online Consumer Reviews on Using E-Shopping Service of E-Commerce

Science.gov (United States)

Hurriyati, R.; Lisnawati; Rhamdani, F.

2017-03-01

The Internet has become the primary source of information for a large number of consumers and it enables consumers to share their opinions and experiences about goods and services. Online consumer reviews provide information and recommendations for prospective buyers and are helpful for decision-making on purchases. The purpose of this study is to assess the impact of online consumer reviews on a decision of using e-commerce services. Sample size has been conducted among 435 respondents of e-commerce customers who use google play. to test the research hypothesis path analysis. The result indicates that Positive and negative statements in reviews are strong influence consumers whether to use the services that offered by e-commerce, online consumer reviews have an impact on the consumer decision of using e-commerce services. Finally, some practical valuable feedback for future research and practical contribution has been made.

Community Structure in Online Collegiate Social Networks

Science.gov (United States)

Traud, Amanda; Kelsic, Eric; Mucha, Peter; Porter, Mason

2009-03-01

Online social networking sites have become increasingly popular with college students. The networks we studied are defined through ``friendships'' indicated by Facebook users from UNC, Oklahoma, Caltech, Georgetown, and Princeton. We apply the tools of network science to study the Facebook networks from these five different universities at a single point in time. We investigate each single-institution network's community structure, which we obtain through partitioning the graph using an eigenvector method. We use both graphical and quantitative tools, including pair-counting methods, which we interpret through statistical analysis and permutation tests to measure the correlations between the network communities and a set of characteristics given by each user (residence, class year, major, and high school). We also analyze the single gender subsets of these networks, and the impact of missing demographical data. Our study allows us to compare the online social networks for the five schools as well as infer differences in offline social interactions. At the schools studied, we were able to define which characteristics of the Facebook users correlate best with friendships.

Examining Thematic Similarity, Difference, and Membership in Three Online Mental Health Communities from Reddit: A Text Mining and Visualization Approach.

Science.gov (United States)

Park, Albert; Conway, Mike; Chen, Annie T

2018-01-01

shared more similarities to one another than to the depression subreddit. We observed that the members of the three communities shared several overlapping concerns (i.e., sleep- and work-related problems) and discussion patterns (i.e., sharing of positive emotion and showing gratitude for receiving emotional support). We also highlighted that the discussions from the r/Anxiety and r/PTSD communities were more similar to one another than to discussions from the r/Depression community. The r/Anxiety and r/PTSD subreddit members are more likely to be individuals whose experiences with a condition are long-term, and who are interested in treatments and medications. The r/Depression subreddit members may be a comparatively diffuse group, many of whom are dealing with transient issues that cause depressed mood. The findings from this study could be used to inform the design of online mental health communities and patient education programs for these conditions. Moreover, we suggest that researchers employ multiple methods to fully understand the subtle differences when comparing similar discussions from online health communities.

Investigation of the nature of the church through an analysis of selected email-based Christian online communities

OpenAIRE

Campbell, Heidi A.

2001-01-01

This thesis investigates Christian online communities, with special emphasis on studying the nature of community and cyberspace. The purpose is to identify characteristics of community that individuals are seeking to cultivate in the online setting, showing possible implications for individuals in the "real world" church and offline communities. The key research question is: "What does online communication offer individual Christians and groups of Christians? How is the Interne...

Online faculty development for creating E-learning materials.

Science.gov (United States)

Niebuhr, Virginia; Niebuhr, Bruce; Trumble, Julie; Urbani, Mary Jo

2014-01-01

Faculty who want to develop e-learning materials face pedagogical challenges of transforming instruction for the online environment, especially as many have never experienced online learning themselves. They face technical challenges of learning new software and time challenges of not all being able to be in the same place at the same time to learn these new skills. The objective of the Any Day Any Place Teaching (ADAPT) faculty development program was to create an online experience in which faculty could learn to produce e-learning materials. The ADAPT curriculum included units on instructional design, copyright principles and peer review, all for the online environment, and units on specific software tools. Participants experienced asynchronous and synchronous methods, including a learning management system, PC-based videoconferencing, online discussions, desktop sharing, an online toolbox and optional face-to-face labs. Project outcomes were e-learning materials developed and participants' evaluations of the experience. Likert scale responses for five instructional units (quantitative) were analyzed for distance from neutral using one-sample t-tests. Interview data (qualitative) were analyzed with assurance of data trustworthiness and thematic analysis techniques. Participants were 27 interprofessional faculty. They evaluated the program instruction as easy to access, engaging and logically presented. They reported increased confidence in new skills and increased awareness of copyright issues, yet continued to have time management challenges and remained uncomfortable about peer review. They produced 22 new instructional materials. Online faculty development methods are helpful for faculty learning to create e-learning materials. Recommendations are made to increase the success of such a faculty development program.

At Issue: Online Education and the New Community College Student

Science.gov (United States)

Castillo, Marco

2013-01-01

Community colleges are facing a demographic shift in their student bodies with significant consequences for how they can utilize instructional innovations such as online education. On the one hand, community colleges are educating an increasing number of adult learners, with a set of psychological, academic, and personal characteristics that make…

Factors Associated With Weight Change in Online Weight Management Communities: A Case Study in the LoseIt Reddit Community.

Science.gov (United States)

Pappa, Gisele Lobo; Cunha, Tiago Oliveira; Bicalho, Paulo Viana; Ribeiro, Antonio; Couto Silva, Ana Paula; Meira, Wagner; Beleigoli, Alline Maria Rezende

2017-01-16

Recent research has shown that of the 72% of American Internet users who have looked for health information online, 22% have searched for help to lose or control weight. This demand for information has given rise to many online weight management communities, where users support one another throughout their weight loss process. Whether and how user engagement in online communities relates to weight change is not totally understood. We investigated the activity behavior and analyze the semantic content of the messages of active users in LoseIt (r/loseit), a weight management community of the online social network Reddit. We then explored whether these features are associated with weight loss in this online social network. A data collection tool was used to collect English posts, comments, and other public metadata of active users (ie, users with at least one post or comment) on LoseIt from August 2010 to November 2014. Analyses of frequency and intensity of user interaction in the community were performed together with a semantic analysis of the messages, done by a latent Dirichlet allocation method. The association between weight loss and online user activity patterns, the semantics of the messages, and real-world variables was found by a linear regression model using 30-day weight change as the dependent variable. We collected posts and comments of 107,886 unique users. Among these, 101,003 (93.62%) wrote at least one comment and 38,981 (36.13%) wrote at least one post. Median percentage of days online was 3.81 (IQR 9.51). The 10 most-discussed semantic topics on posts were related to healthy food, clothing, calorie counting, workouts, looks, habits, support, and unhealthy food. In the subset of 754 users who had gender, age, and 30-day weight change data available, women were predominant and 92.9% (701/754) lost weight. Female gender, body mass index (BMI) at baseline, high levels of online activity, the number of upvotes received per post, and topics discussed

Understanding patient e-loyalty toward online health care services.

Science.gov (United States)

Martínez-Caro, Eva; Cegarra-Navarro, Juan Gabriel; Solano-Lorente, Marcelina

2013-01-01

Public health institutions are making a great effort to develop patient-targeted online services in an attempt to enhance their effectiveness and reduce expenses. However, if patients do not use those services regularly, public health institutions will have wasted their limited resources. Hence, patients' electronic loyalty (e-loyalty) is essential for the success of online health care services. In this research, an extended Technology Acceptance Model was developed to test e-loyalty intent toward online health care services offered by public health institutions. Data from a survey of 256 users of online health care services provided by the public sanitary system of a region in Spain were analyzed. The research model was tested by using the structural equation modeling approach. The results obtained suggest that the core constructs of the Technology Acceptance Model (perceived usefulness, ease of use, and attitude) significantly affected users' behavioral intentions (i.e., e-loyalty intent), with perceived usefulness being the most decisive antecedent of affective variables (i.e., attitude and satisfaction). This study also reveals a general support for patient satisfaction as a determinant of e-loyalty intent in online health care services. Policy makers should focus on striving to get the highest positive attitude in users by enhancing easiness of use and, mainly, perceived usefulness. Because through satisfaction of patients, public hospitals will enlarge their patient e-loyalty intent, health care providers must always work at obtaining satisfied users and to encourage them to continue using the online services.

Exploring the learning context in shifts between online and offline learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Karen Borgnakke

2015-11-01

Full Text Available By Karen BorgnakkeIn this issue we have collected papers related to the conference called Rethinking Educational Ethnography: Researching on-line communities and interactions. The articles address issues based on ethnographic approaches and case studies on the implementation of digital technology in different learning context.The articles reflect on the multi-sited research coping with ICT and learning in shifting online offline settings. In many respects, the shift and the tendencies to blend strategies are a challenging part of the educational development combined with the need for research-based evaluation of the blended practice. This involvement raises basic questions to ethnographers: How to explore the learning context and the shift between online and offline in the fields of practice? How to observe and collect data about formal/non-formal learning? How to analyze the learning space and processes?The papers mirror these research issues and mirror the challenges to enhance the qualitative and empirical research in secondary, upper secondary schools and in higher education. The authors represent the new mode of ethnography having the digital circuit integrated in the field of practice as well as in the methodological framework.The articles relate to the fourth conference in Rethinking Educational Ethnography: Researching on-line communities and interactions organized by the Department of Media, Cognition and Communication, the section of education at the university of Copenhagen, in collaboration with the research group Innovative Learning Context and with ECER Network 19.The conference forms part of a long-term discussion that began in Helsinki at ECER 2010 and gave rise to the first annual Rethinking Educational Ethnography conference, held at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, University of Porto. The second and the third annual Conference was held at the University of Barcelona and at the University of Napoli

Exploring user-producer interaction in an online community : The case of Habbo Hotel

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Slot, M.

2009-01-01

This article attempts to explore the user-producer interaction in the online community of Habbo Hotel. Based on desk research, interviews, an online survey among more than 3000 Habbo Hotel users in The Netherlands and online discussion groups with 45 Habbos, three specific issues that illustrate the

One Happy Union: Infusing Community-Based Learning Projects through Online Instruction

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, Jason W.; Kane, Jennifer; Cavanaugh, Terence

2015-01-01

Both community-based learning (CBL) and online learning are popular pedagogical practices, with distinct benefits and issues for teaching and learning. The integration of these practices may seem challenging, but they can be compatible. This article seeks to provide effective examples and support for conducting CBL projects in online courses while…

The search conference as a method in planning community health promotion actions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Eva Magnus

2016-08-01

Full Text Available Aims: The aim of this article is to describe and discuss how the search conference can be used as a method for planning health promotion actions in local communities. Design and methods: The article draws on experiences with using the method for an innovative project in health promotion in three Norwegian municipalities. The method is described both in general and how it was specifically adopted for the project. Results and conclusions: The search conference as a method was used to develop evidence-based health promotion action plans. With its use of both bottom-up and top-down approaches, this method is a relevant strategy for involving a community in the planning stages of health promotion actions in line with political expectations of participation, ownership, and evidence-based initiatives.

Copyright, Culture, and Community in Virtual Worlds

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dan Burk

2016-11-01

Full Text Available Communities that interact on-line through computer games and other virtual worlds are mediated by the audiovisual content of the game interface. Much of this content is subject to copyright law, which confers on the copyright owner the legal right to prevent certain unauthorized uses of the content. Such exclusive rights impose a limiting factor on the development of communities that are situated around the interface content, as the rights, privileges, and exceptions associated with copyright generally tend to disregard the cultural significance of copyrighted content. This limiting effect of copyright is well illustrated by examination of the copying of content by virtual diaspora communities such as that formed around the game Uru: Ages of Myst; thus, the opportunity for on-line communities to legally access the graphical elements on which those communities are built is fraught with potential legal liability. This presents the reciprocal situation from efforts to protect the cultural properties of indigenous communities as traditional knowledge. Reconsideration of current copyright law would be required in order to accommodate the cohesion of on-line communities and related cultural uses of copyrighted content.

Emotional persistence in online chatting communities

Science.gov (United States)

Garas, Antonios; Garcia, David; Skowron, Marcin; Schweitzer, Frank

2012-05-01

How do users behave in online chatrooms, where they instantaneously read and write posts? We analyzed about 2.5 million posts covering various topics in Internet relay channels, and found that user activity patterns follow known power-law and stretched exponential distributions, indicating that online chat activity is not different from other forms of communication. Analysing the emotional expressions (positive, negative, neutral) of users, we revealed a remarkable persistence both for individual users and channels. I.e. despite their anonymity, users tend to follow social norms in repeated interactions in online chats, which results in a specific emotional ``tone'' of the channels. We provide an agent-based model of emotional interaction, which recovers qualitatively both the activity patterns in chatrooms and the emotional persistence of users and channels. While our assumptions about agent's emotional expressions are rooted in psychology, the model allows to test different hypothesis regarding their emotional impact in online communication.

Speaking as one, but not speaking up : dealing with new moral taint in an occupational online community

OpenAIRE

Vaast, Emmanuelle; Levina, Natalia

2015-01-01

This paper builds a process theory of how participants in an online community deal with a new identity threat. Based upon the in-depth, interpretive case study of an online community of retail bankers, it develops a grounded theory that reveals that participants in an online community deal with new taint by protecting their occupation's identity but not by attempting to repair its external image. In the investigated community, reactions progressed from rejecting the taint to distancing from i...

E-COMMERCE FACTORS INFLUENCING CONSUMERS‘ ONLINE SHOPPING DECISION

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Živilė Baubonienė

2015-12-01

Full Text Available Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to look at the factors driving online shopping and to develop an understanding of the factors influencing the online shopping by the consumers. This is done by exploring the factors that encourage consumers to shop online through analysis of such advantages as security, fast delivery, comparable price, convenience, cheaper prices and a wider choice. At the same time, the research project reveals the factors that are discouraging for consumers and the benefits received by buyers making purchases online. Specifically, the research explores how online shopping can be affected by such factors as age, gender or occupation. Design/methodology/approach – The factors that affect the consumer online shopping have been disclosed through quantitative research by analysing data collected via a web‐based questionnaire survey. The sample consisted of 183 Lithuanian consumers who were purchasing online. Findings –The empirical findings of this study indicate that the main factors influencing consumers to shop online are convenience, simplicity and better price. Analysis of socio-demographical characteristics such as gender has shown that men shop more often online because of the lower price. Respondents of the 25–35 year age group more often choose shopping online for such reasons as lack of time and a wide range of products. The most beneficial factor of shopping online was identified as a possibility to compare prices and buy at a lower price. Research limitations/implications – This study was done regarding only general conditions and the findings may not necessarily be applicable to a particular e-business. Therefore, in the future it would be highly encouraged to examine consumers’ attitudes towards specialized online shopping websites to look for differences by kind of products or services.Practical implications – Attributes identified by this study could help e-business developers to forme their

Understanding a Nonlinear Causal Relationship Between Rewards and Physicians’ Contributions in Online Health Care Communities: Longitudinal Study

Science.gov (United States)

2017-01-01

Background The online health care community is not just a place for the public to share physician reviews or medical knowledge, but also a physician-patient communication platform. The medical resources of developing countries are relatively inadequate, and the online health care community is a potential solution to alleviate the phenomenon of long hospital queues and the lack of medical resources in rural areas. However, the success of the online health care community depends on online contributions by physicians. Objective The aim of this study is to examine the effect of incentive mechanisms on physician’s online contribution behavior in the online health community. We addressed the following questions: (1) from which specialty area are physicians more likely to participate in online health care community activities, (2) what are the factors affecting physician online contributions, and (3) do incentive mechanisms, including psychological and material rewards, result in differences of physician online contributions? Methods We designed a longitudinal study involving a data sample in three waves. All data were collected from the Good Doctor website, which is the largest online health care community in China. We first used descriptive statistics to investigate the physician online contribution behavior in its entirety. Then multiple linear and quadratic regression models were applied to verify the causal relationship between rewards and physician online contribution. Results Our sample included 40,300 physicians from 3607 different hospitals, 10 different major specialty areas, and 31 different provinces or municipalities. Based on the multiple quadratic regression model, we found that the coefficients of the control variables, past physician online contributions, doctor review rating, clinic title, hospital level, and city level, were .415, .189, –.099, –.106, and –.143, respectively. For the psychological (or material) rewards, the standardized

Answers to Health Questions: Internet Search Results Versus Online Health Community Responses.

Science.gov (United States)

Kanthawala, Shaheen; Vermeesch, Amber; Given, Barbara; Huh, Jina

2016-04-28

About 6 million people search for health information on the Internet each day in the United States. Both patients and caregivers search for information about prescribed courses of treatments, unanswered questions after a visit to their providers, or diet and exercise regimens. Past literature has indicated potential challenges around quality in health information available on the Internet. However, diverse information exists on the Internet-ranging from government-initiated webpages to personal blog pages. Yet we do not fully understand the strengths and weaknesses of different types of information available on the Internet. The objective of this research was to investigate the strengths and challenges of various types of health information available online and to suggest what information sources best fit various question types. We collected questions posted to and the responses they received from an online diabetes community and classified them according to Rothwell's classification of question types (fact, policy, or value questions). We selected 60 questions (20 each of fact, policy, and value) and the replies the questions received from the community. We then searched for responses to the same questions using a search engine and recorded the Community responses answered more questions than did search results overall. Search results were most effective in answering value questions and least effective in answering policy questions. Community responses answered questions across question types at an equivalent rate, but most answered policy questions and the least answered fact questions. Value questions were most answered by community responses, but some of these answers provided by the community were incorrect. Fact question search results were the most clinically valid. The Internet is a prevalent source of health information for people. The information quality people encounter online can have a large impact on them. We present what kinds of questions people ask

A Hybrid Trust-Based Recommender System for Online Communities of Practice

Science.gov (United States)

Zheng, Xiao-Lin; Chen, Chao-Chao; Hung, Jui-Long; He, Wu; Hong, Fu-Xing; Lin, Zhen

2015-01-01

The needs for life-long learning and the rapid development of information technologies promote the development of various types of online Community of Practices (CoPs). In online CoPs, bounded rationality and metacognition are two major issues, especially when learners face information overload and there is no knowledge authority within the…

Designing Online Management Education Courses Using the Community of Inquiry Framework

Science.gov (United States)

Weyant, Lee E.

2013-01-01

Online learning has grown as a program delivery option for many colleges and programs of business. The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework consisting of three interrelated elements--social presence, cognitive presence, and teaching presences--provides a model to guide business faculty in their online course design. The course design of an online…

The E-learning Cabaret: do's and don'ts in E-Learning Design

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Westera, Wim

2009-01-01

Westera, W. (2006). The E-Learning Cabaret: do's and don'ts in E-Learning Design. Book of Abstracts, 12th International Conference on Technology Supported Learning & Teaching, Online Educa Berlin (pp. 169-171). November, 29-December, 1, 2006, Berlin, Germany: ICWE-GmbH.

Understanding a Nonlinear Causal Relationship Between Rewards and Physicians' Contributions in Online Health Care Communities: Longitudinal Study.

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Jying-Nan; Chiu, Ya-Ling; Yu, Haiyan; Hsu, Yuan-Teng

2017-12-21

The online health care community is not just a place for the public to share physician reviews or medical knowledge, but also a physician-patient communication platform. The medical resources of developing countries are relatively inadequate, and the online health care community is a potential solution to alleviate the phenomenon of long hospital queues and the lack of medical resources in rural areas. However, the success of the online health care community depends on online contributions by physicians. The aim of this study is to examine the effect of incentive mechanisms on physician's online contribution behavior in the online health community. We addressed the following questions: (1) from which specialty area are physicians more likely to participate in online health care community activities, (2) what are the factors affecting physician online contributions, and (3) do incentive mechanisms, including psychological and material rewards, result in differences of physician online contributions? We designed a longitudinal study involving a data sample in three waves. All data were collected from the Good Doctor website, which is the largest online health care community in China. We first used descriptive statistics to investigate the physician online contribution behavior in its entirety. Then multiple linear and quadratic regression models were applied to verify the causal relationship between rewards and physician online contribution. Our sample included 40,300 physicians from 3607 different hospitals, 10 different major specialty areas, and 31 different provinces or municipalities. Based on the multiple quadratic regression model, we found that the coefficients of the control variables, past physician online contributions, doctor review rating, clinic title, hospital level, and city level, were .415, .189, -.099, -.106, and -.143, respectively. For the psychological (or material) rewards, the standardized coefficient of the main effect was 0.261 (or 0

ICE-B 2008 : International Conference on e-Business: Proceedings

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Filipe, Joaquim; Marca, David A.; Shishkov, Boris; van Sinderen, Marten J.

2008-01-01

The purpose of ICE-B 2008, the International Conference on e-Business, is to bring together researchers, engineers and practitioners interested in information systems methods and applications in the context of e-business. e-Business is a research area of growing importance, encompassing several

News from the Library: Focus on AIP conference proceedings

CERN Multimedia

CERN Library

2011-01-01

The American Institute of Physics (AIP) publishes conference proceedings covering a broad range of subjects, such as nuclear and particle physics, materials science, astronomy and astrophysics and many more. Today, this series includes some 1,300 volumes, starting with Volume 1 (1970), and dozens of new volumes are added each year.   This represents more than 100,000 conference papers available online. Among other things, AIP publishes e.g. the proceedings of the International Cryogenic Materials Conference, the Cryogenic Engineering Conference, and the International Workshop on Neutrino Factories and Superbeams. You can access AIP conference proceedings from CERN or from outside, thanks to the Library Proxy Service. See instructions on how to access them from outside CERN: access AIP Proceedings. Please send any feedback and questions to library.desk@cern.ch.  

Community crosstalk: An exploratory analysis of destination and festival eWOM on Twitter

OpenAIRE

Williams, Nigel; Inversini, Alessandro; Buhalis, Dimitrios; Ferdinand, Nicole

2015-01-01

Research suggests that festivals can promote a destination via online word-of-mouth (eWOM) on socialmedia, even though the nature of this effect is not yet fully understood. Using a combination of Social Network Analysis and text analysis (qualitative and quantitative), this article examines eWOM at a tourism destination (Bournemouth) when a festival (Bournemouth Air Show 2013) is staged. The Communities of Interest of eWOM interactions on Twitter were captured and analysed to understand the ...

Community crosstalk: an exploratory analysis of destination and festival eWOM on Twitter

OpenAIRE

Williams, Nigel L.; Inversini, Alessandro; Buhalis, Dimitrios; Ferdinand, Nicole

2015-01-01

Research suggests that festivals can promote a destination via online word-of-mouth (eWOM) on social media, even though the nature of this effect is not yet fully understood. Using a combination of Social Network Analysis and text analysis (qualitative and quantitative), this article examines eWOM at a tourism destination (Bournemouth) when a festival (Bournemouth Air Show 2013) is staged. The Communities of Interest of eWOM interactions on Twitter were captured and analysed to understand the...

An online community improves adherence in an internet-mediated walking program. Part 1: results of a randomized controlled trial.

Science.gov (United States)

Richardson, Caroline R; Buis, Lorraine R; Janney, Adrienne W; Goodrich, David E; Sen, Ananda; Hess, Michael L; Mehari, Kathleen S; Fortlage, Laurie A; Resnick, Paul J; Zikmund-Fisher, Brian J; Strecher, Victor J; Piette, John D

2010-12-17

Approximately half of American adults do not meet recommended physical activity guidelines. Face-to-face lifestyle interventions improve health outcomes but are unlikely to yield population-level improvements because they can be difficult to disseminate, expensive to maintain, and inconvenient for the recipient. In contrast, Internet-based behavior change interventions can be disseminated widely at a lower cost. However, the impact of some Internet-mediated programs is limited by high attrition rates. Online communities that allow participants to communicate with each other by posting and reading messages may decrease participant attrition. Our objective was to measure the impact of adding online community features to an Internet-mediated walking program on participant attrition and average daily step counts. This randomized controlled trial included sedentary, ambulatory adults who used email regularly and had at least 1 of the following: overweight (body mass index [BMI] ≥ 25), type 2 diabetes, or coronary artery disease. All participants (n = 324) wore enhanced pedometers throughout the 16-week intervention and uploaded step-count data to the study server. Participants could log in to the study website to view graphs of their walking progress, individually-tailored motivational messages, and weekly calculated goals. Participants were randomized to 1 of 2 versions of a Web-based walking program. Those randomized to the "online community" arm could post and read messages with other participants while those randomized to the "no online community" arm could not read or post messages. The main outcome measures were participant attrition and average daily step counts over 16 weeks. Multiple regression analyses assessed the effect of the online community access controlling for age, sex, disease status, BMI, and baseline step counts. Both arms significantly increased their average daily steps between baseline and the end of the intervention period, but there were no

Examining political mobilization of online communities through e-petitioning behavior in

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Catherine L Dumas

2015-08-01

Full Text Available This study aims to reveal patterns of e-petition co-signing behavior that are indicative of the political mobilization of online “communities”. We discuss the case of We the People , a US national experiment in the use of social media technology to enable users to propose and solicit support for policy suggestions to the White House. We apply Baumgartner and Jones's work on agenda setting and punctuated equilibrium, which suggests that policy issues may lie dormant for periods of time until some event triggers attention from the media, interest groups, and elected representatives. In the case study presented, we focus on 21 petitions initiated during the week after the Sandy Hook shooting (14–21 December 2012 in opposition to gun control or in support of policy proposals that are alternatives to gun control, which we view as mobilized efforts to maintain stability and equilibrium in a policy system threatening to change. Using market basket analysis and social network analysis we found a core group of petitions in the “support law-abiding gun owners” theme that were highly connected and four “communities” of e-petitioners mobilizing in opposition to change in gun control policies and in favor of alternative proposals.

L’INSEGNAMENTO DELLA LINGUA E DELLA CULTURA ITALIANA IN CORSI “BLENDED” E ONLINE

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Daniela Bartalesi-Graf

2017-03-01

Full Text Available Questo articolo inizia con una discussione del contributo delle nuove tecnologie Web 2.0 alla creazione e alla condivisione di conoscenze, e di come queste tecnologie abbiamo influenzato il modo in cui i nostri studenti imparano, il modo in cui noi insegniamo e la missione dei nostri programmi, specialmente negli Stati Uniti dove insegno. Segue l’analisi di un’iniziativa del nostro Dipartimento di Italianistica al Wellesley College per rispondere a questi cambiamenti: la creazione di un corso online di lingua e cultura italiana offerto in vari contesti, vale a dire come corso estivo SPOC (Small Private Online Course; come corso “blended”a Wellesley College e al MIT, e come MOOC (Massive Open Online Course sulla piattaforma edX. L’articolo si conclude con alcune proposte concrete per rafforzare i nostri programmi: queste includono la creazione di una piattaforma per condividere il nostro materiale didattico (digitale e non, per valutare i nostri programmi e i risultati raggiunti dagli studenti. Teaching “blended” and online italian language and culture courses This article begins with a discussion of the contribution of new Web 2.0 technologies in the creation and sharing of knowledge, and how these technologies have affected the way in which our students learn, the way we teach and the mission of our programs, especially in the US where I teach. This is followed by analysis of an initiative of the Department of Italian Studies at Wellesley College in response to these changes: the creation of an online Italian culture and language course offered in various contexts, i.e. as a summer SPOC (Small Private Online Course course; as a “blended” course at Wellesley College and MIT, and as a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course on the EDX platform. The article concludes with some concrete proposals to strengthen these programs. These include the creation of a platform to share educational materials (digital and otherwise and to evaluate

Preferences for Internet-Based Mental Health Interventions in an Adult Online Sample: Findings From an Online Community Survey.

Science.gov (United States)

Batterham, Philip J; Calear, Alison L

2017-06-30

Despite extensive evidence that Internet interventions are effective in treating mental health problems, uptake of Internet programs is suboptimal. It may be possible to make Internet interventions more accessible and acceptable through better understanding of community preferences for delivery of online programs. This study aimed to assess community preferences for components, duration, frequency, modality, and setting of Internet interventions for mental health problems. A community-based online sample of 438 Australian adults was recruited using social media advertising and administered an online survey on preferences for delivery of Internet interventions, along with scales assessing potential correlates of these preferences. Participants reported a preference for briefer sessions, although they recognized a trade-off between duration and frequency of delivery. No clear preference for the modality of delivery emerged, although a clear majority preferred tailored programs. Participants preferred to access programs through a computer rather than a mobile device. Although most participants reported that they would seek help for a mental health problem, more participants had a preference for face-to-face sources only than online programs only. Younger, female, and more educated participants were significantly more likely to prefer Internet delivery. Adults in the community have a preference for Internet interventions with short modules that are tailored to individual needs. Individuals who are reluctant to seek face-to-face help may also avoid Internet interventions, suggesting that better implementation of existing Internet programs requires increasing acceptance of Internet interventions and identifying specific subgroups who may be resistant to seeking help. ©Philip J Batterham, Alison L Calear. Originally published in JMIR Mental Health (http://mental.jmir.org), 30.06.2017.

Introducing Educate~ online

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Geoff Whitty

2006-06-01

Full Text Available In 2001, the first issue of a new journal was published that focused on disseminating the work of postgraduate researchers at the Institute of Education. This new journal was called: Educate ~ The London Journal of Doctoral Research in Education. It offered a new opportunity to the community of postgraduate researchers, whether full-time and part-time, home or international, undertaking professional doctorates or MPhil/PhD research, to publish and disseminate their research. Educate~ offers a publication outlet for this sizable and diverse group of doctoral researchers, enabling the publication of work-in-progress as well as fully-fledged papers. It also offers a starting point for conversations between the Institute’s postgraduate researchers and its established academic staff, allowing each to learn from the other, thereby developing the Institute’s research community. These conversations have continued to develop with the biannual Doctoral School conferences, now a well-established feature here at the Institute. Indeed, the abstracts for the Summer Conference are included in this issue of Educate~. The inaugural Editorial, back in 2001, stated that “our success will depend on the continuing willingness of potential contributors to provide us with interesting, thought provoking and engaging material” and I encourage readers to look back through the online archives to see how successful Educate~ has been. The development of software to enable academic journals to appear online and, importantly, to manage the entire editorial process electronically, presented an opportunity for Educate~ that could not be missed. Educate~ has now successfully moved to an online format. Doing so allows Educate~ to integrate photographic materials, audio files and audiovisual files and even podcasts - like this one, into what it publishes. Indeed, Educate~ does not just contain abstracts from this year’s Summer Conference, but also podcasts of a

Indico CONFERENCE: Define the Programme

CERN Multimedia

CERN. Geneva; Ferreira, Pedro

2017-01-01

In this tutorial you are going to learn how to define the programme of a conference in Indico. The program of your conference is divided in different “tracks”. Tracks represent the subject matter of the conference, such as “Online Computing”, “Offline Computing”, and so on.

The Effects of Online Communities of Practice on Pre-Service Teachers' Critical Thinking Dispositions

Science.gov (United States)

Ekici, Didem Inel

2017-01-01

This empirical study attempted to investigate the effect of using online communities of practice in teacher education on pre-service teachers' critical thinking dispositions. California Critical Thinking Disposition Inventory and the comments posted to the online community of practice were used as the data collection tools. Results showed that…

Blended Learning and Sense of Community: A Comparative Analysis with Traditional and Fully Online Graduate Courses

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Fred Rovai and Hope Jordan

2004-08-01

Full Text Available Blended learning is a hybrid of classroom and online learning that includes some of the conveniences of online courses without the complete loss of face-to-face contact. The present study used a causal-comparative design to examine the relationship of sense of community between traditional classroom, blended, and fully online higher education learning environments. Evidence is provided to suggest that blended courses produce a stronger sense of community among students than either traditional or fully online courses.

Long-Term Condition Self-Management Support in Online Communities: A Meta-Synthesis of Qualitative Papers

Science.gov (United States)

Vassilev, Ivaylo; Kennedy, Anne; Rogers, Anne

2016-01-01

Background Recent years have seen an exponential increase in people with long-term conditions using the Internet for information and support. Prior research has examined support for long-term condition self-management through the provision of illness, everyday, and emotional work in the context of traditional offline communities. However, less is known about how communities hosted in digital spaces contribute through the creation of social ties and the mobilization of an online illness “workforce.” Objective The aim was to understand the negotiation of long-term condition illness work in patient online communities and how such work may assist the self-management of long-term conditions in daily life. Methods A systematic search of qualitative papers was undertaken using various online databases for articles published since 2004. A total of 21 papers met the inclusion criteria of using qualitative methods and examined the use of peer-led online communities for those with a long-term condition. A qualitative meta-synthesis was undertaken and the review followed a line of argument synthesis. Results The main themes identified in relation to the negotiation of self-management support were (1) redressing offline experiential information and knowledge deficits, (2) the influence of modeling and learning behaviors from others on self-management, (3) engagement that validates illness and negates offline frustrations, (4) tie formation and community building, (5) narrative expression and cathartic release, and (6) dissociative anonymity and invisibility. These translated into a line of argument synthesis in which four network mechanisms for self-management support in patient online communities were identified. These were (1) collective knowledge and identification through lived experience; (2) support, information, and engagement through readily accessible gifting relationships; (3) sociability that extends beyond illness; and (4) online disinhibition as a facilitator

Interactive On-Line Conferences.

Science.gov (United States)

1984-12-01

met. The condition is tested by examining the fields of the array ws-bl tmap -ackd for the workstation(s) of interest. (The - - fields are...currently are or ever were active; a given workstation therefore has a fixed "index" into these arrays for the duration of a conference. " The b I tmap

ASSESSMENT OF A MULTINATIONAL ONLINE FACULTY DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM ON ONLINE TEACHING: REFLECTIONS OF CANDIDATE E-TUTORS

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Muge ADNAN

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Teaching online requires different skills, roles and competencies for online instructors compared to teaching in traditional learning environments. Universities should offer ongoing support in various forms to help academic staff through their online journey. This paper provides insights into a multinational faculty development program for teaching online, elaborating on results of expectancy and satisfaction surveys. From a local program to a subproject within the Swiss National Science Foundation Project Scopes, e-Tutor aimed at expanding competencies in online lecturing and providing OER material for training colleagues. Designed in the form of a descriptive case study, this research was conducted with 34 attendees of e-Tutor. Data was collected using an e-learning readiness and expectancy questionnaire, and open-ended questions after the program to measure satisfaction. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the survey data and content analysis for open-ended data. Participants considered e-Tutor a well-planned and targeted program with good theoretical and practical balance. Duration of such courses, opportunities for adaptation to real-life situations, and localization of the content are areas to be explored further. For future studies, it would also be interesting to see whether participants can apply their newly acquired knowledge and skills to create efficient online learning environments.

Personas in online health communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Huh, Jina; Kwon, Bum Chul; Kim, Sung-Hee; Lee, Sukwon; Choo, Jaegul; Kim, Jihoon; Choi, Min-Je; Yi, Ji Soo

2016-10-01

Many researchers and practitioners use online health communities (OHCs) to influence health behavior and provide patients with social support. One of the biggest challenges in this approach, however, is the rate of attrition. OHCs face similar problems as other social media platforms where user migration happens unless tailored content and appropriate socialization is supported. To provide tailored support for each OHC user, we developed personas in OHCs illustrating users' needs and requirements in OHC use. To develop OHC personas, we first interviewed 16 OHC users and administrators to qualitatively understand varying user needs in OHC. Based on their responses, we developed an online survey to systematically investigate OHC personas. We received 184 survey responses from OHC users, which informed their values and their OHC use patterns. We performed open coding analysis with the interview data and cluster analysis with the survey data and consolidated the analyses of the two datasets. Four personas emerged-Caretakers, Opportunists, Scientists, and Adventurers. The results inform users' interaction behavior and attitude patterns with OHCs. We discuss implications for how these personas inform OHCs in delivering personalized informational and emotional support. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Get Involved in Education and Public Outreach! The Science Mission Directorate Science E/PO Forums Are Here to Help

Science.gov (United States)

Shipp, S. S.; Buxner, S.; Schwerin, T. G.; Hsu, B. C.; Peticolas, L. M.; Smith, D.; Meinke, B. K.

2013-12-01

NASA's Science Mission Directorate (SMD) Education and Public Outreach (E/PO) Forums help to engage, extend, support, and coordinate the efforts of the community of E/PO professionals and scientists involved in Earth and space science education activities. This work is undertaken to maximize the effectiveness and efficiency of the overall national NASA science education and outreach effort made up of individual efforts run by these education professionals. This includes facilitating scientist engagement in education and outreach. The Forums have been developing toolkits and pathways to support planetary, Earth, astrophysics, and heliophysics scientists who are - or who are interested in becoming - involved in E/PO. These tools include: 1) Pathways to learn about SMD and E/PO community announcements and opportunities, share news about E/PO programs, let the E/PO community know you are interested in becoming involved, and discover education programs needing scientist input and/or support. These pathways include weekly e-news, the SMD E/PO online community workspace, monthly community calls, conferences and meetings of opportunity. 2) Portals to help you find out what education resources already exist, obtain resources to share with students of all levels - from K-12 to graduate students, - and disseminate your materials. These include E/PO samplers and toolkits (sampling of resources selected for scientists who work with students, teachers, and the public), the one-stop shop of reviewed resources from the NASA Earth and space science education portfolio NASAWavelength.org, and the online clearinghouse of Earth and space science higher education materials EarthSpace (http://www.lpi.usra.edu/earthspace). 3) Connections to education specialists who can help you design and implement meaningful E/PO programs - small to large. Education specialists can help you understand what research says about how people learn and effective practices for achieving your goals, place your

The Effect of Online Collaboration on Adolescent Sense of Community in Eighth-Grade Physical Science

Science.gov (United States)

Wendt, Jillian L.; Rockinson-Szapkiw, Amanda J.

2015-10-01

Using a quasi-experimental, nonequivalent pretest/posttest control group design, the researchers examined the effects of online collaborative learning on eighth-grade student's sense of community in a physical science class. For a 9-week period, students in the control group participated in collaborative activities in a face-to-face learning environment, whereas students in the experimental group participated in online collaborative activities using the Edmodo educational platform in a hybrid learning environment. Students completed the Classroom Community Scale survey as a pretest and posttest. Results indicated that the students who participated in the face-to-face classroom had higher overall sense of community and learning community than students who participated in collaborative activities in the online environment. Results and implications are discussed and suggestions for future research are provided.

Gaming out online: Black lesbian identity development and community building in Xbox Live.

Science.gov (United States)

Gray, Kishonna L

2017-11-22

As gaming culture continues to marginalize women and people of color, other gamers are also highlighting the inequalities they face within digital gaming communities. While heterosexism and homophobia are commonplace within gaming culture, little is known about the actual experiences of "gaymers" and even less about "gaymers" of color. As such, this article seeks to explore lesbians of color and their experiences "gayming" out and online. Exploring identity development, community building, and connectivity via social networking, the women within this study articulate what it means to be lesbian online and how this impacts their physical and digital experiences. The private spaces within gaming culture that many marginalized groups inhabit are the few spaces that value the articulation of marginalized interests and viewpoints. Ethnographic observations reveal how supportive communities can improve resilience by mitigating the effects of stereotyping, microaggressions, and other discriminatory practices in online gaming.

Understanding Trail Runners' Activity on Online Community Forums: An Inductive Analysis of Discussion Topics.

Science.gov (United States)

Rochat, Nadège; Hauw, Denis; Gür, Gaëlle; Seifert, Ludovic

2018-03-01

Recreational trail runners often participate in online community forums where they can freely read posted messages, join discussions and/or introduce new discussion topics. This tool can enhance learning as runners connect with other trail runners and reflect on how they can better organize their own practice. Studying forum activity would provide greater insight into the relationship between field practice and dedicated forums. The aim of this study was therefore to detect the topics discussed online by trail runners in order to understand how they collectively look for solutions that help them adapt to issues that emerge during actual practice. The discussion topics (n = 171) on the forum hosted by the Raidlight brand were examined using inductive content analysis, which distinguished two general dimensions. The first dimension was training and had four first-order themes (i.e., "specific trail running sessions", "complementary trail running sessions". "training plans" and "specific questions about races") grouped into two second-order themes (i.e., "training session contents" and "structure and schedule"). The second dimension was health and had seven first-order themes (i.e., "tendinitis", "muscle issues", "foot issues", "sprains and fractures", "pain", "physiology" and "substances and practitioners") grouped into two second-order themes (i.e., "pain and injury" and "prevention"). The results indicate that the issues that trail runners discuss on forums are significant and that the successions of questions and solutions are a fruitful means for building, enriching and adjusting their activity as they cope with constraints. As a practical consequence, suggestions for improving such online platforms are made.

The influence of electronic-word-of-mouth on consumer decision-making for beauty products in a Kuwaiti Women's online community

OpenAIRE

Alhaidari, N; Coughlan, J

2014-01-01

Online communities are an important source of electronic-word-of-mouth (eWOM), however few studies have examined these types of messages within the Middle Eastern context. This study focuses on Kuwaiti women as members of an online beauty forum; previous work has suggested a mediating effect of gender with women being more likely to trust and follow-up word-of-mouth with a purchase. A conceptual model, based on existing theoretical contributions, provides the basis of a coding framework for t...

Radiology online: information, education, and networking--a summary of the 2012 Intersociety Committee Summer Conference.

Science.gov (United States)

Dodd, Gerald D; Naeger, David M

2013-05-01

The "new online" (Web 2.0) world is evolving rapidly, and the digital information, education, and networking resources available to radiologists have exploded over the past 2 decades. The 2012 Intersociety Committee Summer Conference attendees explored the online resources that have been produced by societies, universities, and commercial entities. Specific attention was given to identifying the best products and packaging them in tablet computers for use by residents and practicing radiologists. The key functions of social networking websites and the possible roles they can play in radiology were explored as well. It was the consensus of the attendees that radiologic digital resources and portable electronic devices have matured to the point that they should become an integral part of our educational programs and clinical practice. Copyright © 2013 American College of Radiology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Why Conferences Matter—An Illustration from the International Marine Conservation Congress

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Samantha Oester

2017-08-01

Full Text Available A major activity in the life of an academic is the professional conference. It is common knowledge that this is a place to present your research, but what about other benefits of attending a conference? Online surveys were distributed to delegates of the 3rd and 4th International Marine Conservation Congresses (IMCCs, with respondents' (n = 100 feedback including that the congresses provided useful new information that will aid: (1 their research (58%; (2 in-the-field conservation (29%; (3 conservation communication (46%; and (4 conservation and management policy making (45%. They also reported gaining new techniques (56%, skills (64%, and novel ideas (70% to further their research/careers. Nearly all (91% gained new contacts that improved their research, in-the-field conservation, science communication, and/or conservation policy making. Two thirds (64% gained ideas, contacts, and/or lessons could lead to publications. Over a third (39% gained new ideas, contacts and/or lessons that led to grant proposals, and 36% gained contacts that led to funding. A conference is not just an avenue for a scientist to present their research to the wider community, but it can be an important venue for brainstorming, networking and making vital connections that can lead to new initiatives, papers and funding, in a way that virtual, online meetings cannot. This is why conferences matter.

Joint Interactions in Large Online Knowledge Communities: The A[subscript 3]C Framework

Science.gov (United States)

Jeong, Heisawn; Cress, Ulrike; Moskaliuk, Johannes; Kimmerle, Joachim

2017-01-01

Social interaction is crucial for understanding individual and collective processes in knowledge communities. We describe how technology has changed the way people interact in large communities. Building on this description, we propose a framework that distinguishes four types of joint interactions in online knowledge communities: Attendance,…

E-Learning Lifecycles:How Communities and Context can affect E-learning Specifications and Tool Design

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Michael Magee

2004-10-01

Full Text Available The development of a large body of e-learning specifications, such as IMS and SCORM, has led to the proposal for a new way to facilitate content workflow. This involves the movement of educational digital content and the knowledge of pedagogical communities into an online space. Several projects have looked at the theoretical structure of these specifications. They implemented a series of tools in order to examine and research the issues around the actual usage of these specifications. The CAREO, ALOHA and ALOHA 2 projects were designed to expose both individual users and whole institutions to these ideas. Initial research into the result of those interactions indicates that there is some utility in the adoption of e-learning specifications. The future success of them will depend on their ability to adapt and meet the needs of the educational community as they begin to adopt, use and evolve the way they use the specifications and the tools created around them.

On-line Professional Learning Communities: Increasing Teacher Learning and Productivity in Isolated Rural Communities

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dora Salazar

2010-08-01

Full Text Available On-line and distance professional learning communities provides teachers with increased access and flexibility as well as the combination of work and education. It also provides a more learner-centered approach, enrichment and new ways of interacting with teachers in isolated rural areas. For educational administrators, on-line learning offers high quality and usually cost-effective professional development for teachers. It allows upgrading of skills, increased productivity and development of a new learning culture. At the same time, it means sharing of costs, of training time, increased portability of training, and the exchange of creativity, information, and dialogue.

Qualitätssicherung von Online-Kursen in E-Learning Portalen

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Stefan Iske

2009-12-01

Full Text Available Dieser Artikel fokussiert den Bereich des Qualitätsmanagements im e-Learning am Beispiel der Qualitätssicherung von Online-Kursen in einem E-Learning-Portal. Dargestellt wird ein Work-Flow spezifischer Qualitätsmanagement-Prozesse: (1 allgemeine Unterstützung der Autoren von Online-Kursen, (2 Evaluation erstellter Online-Kurse, (3 Feedback der Lernenden (Kursteilnehmer an den Kurs-Autor, (4 Feedback der Lernenden an das Qualitätssicherungs-Team (5 Feedback der Kurs-Autoren an das Qualitätssicherungs-Team, sowie (6 die zusammenfassende Evaluation des Lernenden- und Experten-Feedback durch das Qualitätssicherungs-Team. Dieser Work-Flow wurde empirisch getestet und in den europäischen E-Learning-Marktplatz "Columbus-Portal" implementiert, welcher im Rahmen des von der Europäischen Kommission (eTEN-Programm finanzierten Projektes " Electronic Learning and Assistan­ce Network" (ELAN entwickelt wurde. This article describes and reflects quality management in the field of e-learning, especially the assurance of the quality of provided on-line courses of an e-learning portal. A work flow of specific processes of quality management is presented, which consist of (1 general support of authors creating on-line courses, (2 evaluation of created on-line courses, (3 feedback of learners (course users to the author, (4 learner feedback to the quality assurance team (5 author feedback to the quality assurance team and (6 the evaluation of learner and expert-feedback. This work flow was empirically tested and implemented in the European e-learning marketplace “Columbus-Portal” which was developed in the project “Electronic Learning and Assistan­ce Network” (ELAN funded by the European Commission (eTen-programme.

Sociocultural Perspective of Science in Online Learning Environments. Communities of Practice in Online Learning Environments

Science.gov (United States)

Erdogan, Niyazi

2016-01-01

Present study reviews empirical research studies related to learning science in online learning environments as a community. Studies published between 1995 and 2015 were searched by using ERIC and EBSCOhost databases. As a result, fifteen studies were selected for review. Identified studies were analyzed with a qualitative content analysis method…

How we use online broadcasting - Web TV - for community engagement

Science.gov (United States)

Allison, M. L.; Conway, F. M.; Matti, J.; Palmer, R.

2013-12-01

The Arizona Geological Survey uses online broadcasting (Webcast or 'Web TV') to help fulfill our statutory mission to 'Inform, advise and assist the public in matters concerning the geological processes, materials and landscapes and the development and use of the mineral resources of this state.' We launched a monthly online broadcast called 'Arizona Mining Review' via Livestream, a low-cost or free video streaming service. The show provides news, interviews, and discussions about mining and mineral resources topics of interest in Arizona, the nation's second largest non-fuel mining state. The costs to set up and broadcast are minor. Interviews with local guests are held in a corner of the AZGS conference room with easy chairs and a couch; long-distance interviews are held via Skype. The broadcast originates from a desktop computer with a webcam, a $60 microphone, three sets of earbud headphones and a powered amplifier. During broadcasts, we supplement interview footage with slides, photos, or video clips that we have or are provided by guests. Initial broadcasts were live; recordings of these were later uploaded to our YouTube channel. Because scheduling and executing a live Internet broadcast is stressful and demanding for both the production team and guests, we recently elected to record and produce episodes prior to broadcasting them. This allows us more control over supplementary materials used during the broadcast; it also permits us to record the broadcast using a high-definition digital video camera that cannot be used for streaming video. In addition to the Arizona Mining Review, we record conferences and workshops and special presentations on topical issues. A video on the recently discovered Little Chino fault has drawn over 3,000 views. Our latest presentations are short 1-2 minute 'video abstracts' delivered by authors of new publications released by the Survey. These include maps and graphics from the reports to help illustrate the topics and their

Sustainable Schools, Sustainable Communities: The View from the West. CAE Spring 2001 Conference [Proceedings] (San Diego, California, March 22-24, 2001).

Science.gov (United States)

Malone, Sara

This paper presents summary conclusions reached by discussion panels that participated in the Committee on Architecture for Education's conference. The conference explored the symbiotic relationship between schools and communities and the ways that schools and communities sustain one another. Panel titles were: "City Heights Urban Village"; "High…

OnLineLectures - eLearning als Ergänzung der tierärztlichen Fortbildung [Online Lectures - continuing education in veterinary medicine assisted by e-learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Leidl, Werner

2008-11-01

Full Text Available [english] Practising veterinarians in Germany are obliged to take part in continuing education. Due to high expenses which are incurred while taking part in continuing education, such as replacement of personnel, travel costs, conference fees, etc., it is important that efforts toward achievement of learning objectives are maximized. Through the introduction of rapid e-learning techniques, several conferences have been digitised and made available via the internet including publication of CD-ROMs to give participants the possibility of repeated learning. The acceptability of this technique was tested via utilisation data and a survey of participants. It was found that 83.3% of lecturers provided their talks (i.e., a total of approximately 196 lectures for digital distribution. The website featuring the on-line lectures recorded an average of 22 visits per day during a 12-month period. The survey conducted on 82 participants showed a high level of acceptance toward the e-learning technique. In conclusion, there is evidence of a great demand for using new media in continuing education for practitioners of veterinary medicine. [german] Die Tierärztinnen und Tierärzte in Deutschland sind gesetzlich zur Fortbildung verpflichtet. Da die Gesamtkosten für die Fortbildung sehr hoch sind (Praxisvertreter, Reisekosten, Tagungsbeitrag, sollte der Lernerfolg möglichst ergiebig sein. Durch Rapid-eLearning wurden mehrere Vortragsveranstaltungen digitalisiert und per Internet und CD verbreitet, um die Möglichkeiten der Nacharbeitung zu verbessern. Anhand der Nutzungszahlen und einer Nutzerbefragung wurde die Akzeptanz dieser Technik überprüft. 83,3% der Referenten stellten ihre Vorträge für eine digitale Verbreitung zur Verfügung, sodass insgesamt 196 online-Vorträge entstanden sind. Die Internetseiten verzeichneten innerhalb von 12 Monaten durchschnittlich 22 Besuche (visits am Tag. In der Befragung von 82 Tagungsteilnehmern konnte eine hohe

The Impact of Participation in Online Cancer Communities on Patient Reported Outcomes: Systematic Review.

Science.gov (United States)

van Eenbergen, Mies C; van de Poll-Franse, Lonneke V; Heine, Peter; Mols, Floortje

2017-09-28

In recent years, the question of how patients' participating in online communities affects various patient reported outcomes (PROs) has been investigated in several ways. This study aimed to systematically review all relevant literature identified using key search terms, with regard to, first, changes in PROs for cancer patients who participate in online communities and, second, the characteristics of patients who report such effects. A computerized search of the literature via PubMed (MEDLINE), PsycINFO (5 and 4 stars), Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, and ScienceDirect was performed. Last search was conducted in June 2017. Studies with the following terms were included: (cancer patient) and (support group or health communities) and (online or Internet). A total of 21 studies were included and independently assessed by 2 investigators using an 11-item quality checklist. The methodological quality of the selected studies varied: 12 were of high quality, eight were of adequate quality, and only one was of low quality. Most of the respondents were women (about 80%), most with breast cancer; their mean age was 50 years. The patients who were active in online support groups were mostly younger and more highly educated than the nonusers. The investigated PROs included general well-being (ie, mood and health), anxiety, depression, quality of life, posttraumatic growth, and cancer-related concerns. Only marginal effects-that is, PRO improvements-were found; in most cases they were insignificant, and in some cases they were contradictory. The main shortcoming of this kind of study is the lack of methodological instruments for reliable measurements. Furthermore, some patients who participate in online communities or interact with peers via Internet do not expect to measure changes in their PROs. If cancer survivors want to meet other survivors and share information or get support, online communities can be a trustworthy and reliable platform to facilitate

Dare to share? How people share high-quality knowledge in online communities

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Rotundo, Enrico; Blank, M.; Moser, C.; Leopold, H.

The Internet has fundamentally changed how work gets done in the 21st century. For example, people increasingly spend time on the Internet where they share and develop knowledge in online communities. Yet, little is known about how high-quality knowledge comes about in these communities. This is

Perceived Stress in Online Prostate Cancer Community Participants: Examining Relationships with Stigmatization, Social Support Network Preference, and Social Support Seeking.

Science.gov (United States)

Rising, Camella J; Bol, Nadine; Burke-Garcia, Amelia; Rains, Stephen; Wright, Kevin B

2017-06-01

Men with prostate cancer often need social support to help them cope with illness-related physiological and psychosocial challenges. Whether those needs are met depends on receiving support optimally matched to their needs. This study examined relationships between perceived stress, prostate cancer-related stigma, weak-tie support preference, and online community use for social support in a survey of online prostate cancer community participants (n = 149). Findings revealed a positive relationship between stigma and perceived stress. This relationship, however, was moderated by weak-tie support preference and online community use for social support. Specifically, stigma was positively related to perceived stress when weak-tie support was preferred. Analyses also showed a positive relationship between stigma and perceived stress in those who used their online community for advice or emotional support. Health communication scholars should work collaboratively with diagnosed men, clinicians, and online community administrators to develop online interventions that optimally match social support needs.

Presentations of the PTAC wireless, telecommunications and e-business technology conference

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2003-07-01

This conference was attended by experts in the telecommunications industry who demonstrated how the petroleum industry can reduce costs and improve profitability through innovative wireless, telecommunications and e-business technology solutions. The conference was divided into two main sessions, featuring field operation presentations and head office presentations. Current technologies and success stories and challenges were presented for exploration, drilling, completions and production operations. The conference featured 16 presentations, of which 12 have been indexed separately for inclusion in this database. refs., tabs., figs.

An information and dialogue conference on the human genome project (HGP) for the minority communities in the state of Louisiana

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

1999-06-01

Zeta Phi Beta Sorority National Educational Foundation, in cooperation with Xavier University of New Orleans, and the New Orleans District Office of the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, held the Information and Dialogue Conference on the Human Genome Project for the Minority Communities in the State of Louisiana on April 16-17, 1999. The Conference was held on the campus of Xavier University in New Orleans. Community leaders, government officials, minority professional and social organizations leaders, religious leaders, persons from the educational and academic community, and students were invited. Conference objectives included bringing HGP information and a focus in the minority community on the project, in clear and understandable terms, to spread the work in the minority community about the project; to explore the likely positive implications with respect to health care and related matters; to explore possible negative results and strategies to meet them; to discuss the social, legal, and ethical implications; and to facilitate minority input into the HGP as it develops.

Mutual support and recovery in the Russian Alcoholics Anonymous online community

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lyytikäinen Laura

2016-04-01

Full Text Available AIMS – In Russia the paradigm of alcoholism as a disease is still in contrast to the general perception of alcoholics as weak-willed. This article studies alcoholism and recovery in Russia through the case study of the Russian Alcoholics Anonymous online group. It studies how people who are seeking help for their drinking problems in this online community come to incorporate a new self-understanding of being ill with alcoholism.

A pedagogical design pattern framework for sharing experiences and enhancing communities of practice within online and blended learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Chresteria Neutszky-Wulff

2016-12-01

Full Text Available ”Design patterns” were originally proposed in architecture and later in software engineering as a methodology to sketch and share solutions to recurring design problems. In recent years ”pedagogical design patterns” have been introduced as a way to sketch and share good practices in teaching and learning; specifically in the context of technology-enhanced learning (e-learning. Several attempts have been made to establish a framework for describing and sharing such e-learning patterns, but so far they have had limited success. At a series of workshops in a competence-development project for teachers at the University of Copenhagen a new and simpler pedagogical design pattern framework was developed for interfaculty sharing of experiences and enhancing communities of practice in relation to online and blended learning across the university. In this study, the new pedagogical design pattern framework is applied to describe the learning design in four online and blended learning courses within different academic disciplines: Classical Greek, Biostatistics, Environmental Management in Europe, and Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation. Future perspectives for using the framework for developing new E-learning patterns for online and blended learning courses are discussed.

Understanding Trail Runners’ Activity on Online Community Forums: An Inductive Analysis of Discussion Topics

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Rochat Nadège

2018-03-01

Full Text Available Recreational trail runners often participate in online community forums where they can freely read posted messages, join discussions and/or introduce new discussion topics. This tool can enhance learning as runners connect with other trail runners and reflect on how they can better organize their own practice. Studying forum activity would provide greater insight into the relationship between field practice and dedicated forums. The aim of this study was therefore to detect the topics discussed online by trail runners in order to understand how they collectively look for solutions that help them adapt to issues that emerge during actual practice. The discussion topics (n = 171 on the forum hosted by the Raidlight brand were examined using inductive content analysis, which distinguished two general dimensions. The first dimension was training and had four first-order themes (i.e., “specific trail running sessions”, “complementary trail running sessions”. “training plans” and “specific questions about races” grouped into two second-order themes (i.e., “training session contents” and “structure and schedule”. The second dimension was health and had seven first-order themes (i.e., “tendinitis”, “muscle issues”, “foot issues”, “sprains and fractures”, “pain”, “physiology” and “substances and practitioners” grouped into two second-order themes (i.e., “pain and injury” and “prevention”. The results indicate that the issues that trail runners discuss on forums are significant and that the successions of questions and solutions are a fruitful means for building, enriching and adjusting their activity as they cope with constraints. As a practical consequence, suggestions for improving such online platforms are made.

Online Peer-to-Peer Communities in the Daily Lives of People With Chronic Illness: A Qualitative Systematic Review.

Science.gov (United States)

Kingod, Natasja; Cleal, Bryan; Wahlberg, Ayo; Husted, Gitte R

2017-01-01

This qualitative systematic review investigated how individuals with chronic illness experience online peer-to-peer support and how their experiences influence daily life with illness. Selected studies were appraised by quality criteria focused upon research questions and study design, participant selection, methods of data collection, and methods of analysis. Four themes were identified: (a) illness-associated identity work, (b) social support and connectivity, (c) experiential knowledge sharing, and (d) collective voice and mobilization. Findings indicate that online peer-to-peer communities provide a supportive space for daily self-care related to chronic illness. Online communities provided a valued space to strengthen social ties and exchange knowledge that supported offline ties and patient-doctor relationships. Individuals used online communities to exchange experiential knowledge about everyday life with illness. This type of knowledge was perceived as extending far beyond medical care. Online communities were also used to mobilize and raise collective awareness about illness-specific concerns. © The Author(s) 2016.

Using Biographical Prompts to Build Community in an Online Graduate Course: An Adult Learning Perspective

Science.gov (United States)

Lohr, Kathy D.; Haley, Karen J.

2018-01-01

Adult learners are taking advantage of the availability and convenience of online education. Mature learners in online higher education classrooms bring a wealth of experience filtered through cultural, generational, and socioeconomical differences. The purpose of this research was to explore community building in an online graduate course by…

E-Basics: Online Basic Training in Program Evaluation

Science.gov (United States)

Silliman, Ben

2016-01-01

E-Basics is an online training in program evaluation concepts and skills designed for youth development professionals, especially those working in nonformal science education. Ten hours of online training in seven modules is designed to prepare participants for mentoring and applied practice, mastery, and/or team leadership in program evaluation.…

Social control in online communities of consumption: a framework for community management

OpenAIRE

Sibai, Olivier; de Valck, K.; Farrell, A.M.; Rudd, J.M.

2015-01-01

Online communities of consumption (OCCs) represent highly diverse groups of consumers whose interests are not always aligned. Social control in OCCs aims to effectively manage problems arising from this heterogeneity. Extant literature on social control in OCCs is fragmented as some studies focus on the principles of social control, while others focus on the implementation. Moreover, the domain is undertheorized. This article integrates the disparate literature on social control in OCCs provi...

1st Complex Systems Digital Campus World E-Conference 2015

CERN Document Server

Bourgine, Paul; Collet, Pierre

2017-01-01

This book contains the proceedings as well as invited papers for the first annual conference of the UNESCO Unitwin Complex System Digital Campus (CSDC), which is an international initiative gathering 120 Universities on four continents, and structured in ten E-Departments. First Complex Systems Digital Campus World E-Conference 2015 features chapters from the latest research results on theoretical questions of complex systems and their experimental domains. The content contained bridges the gap between the individual and the collective within complex systems science and new integrative sciences on topics such as: genes to organisms to ecosystems, atoms to materials to products, and digital media to the Internet. The conference breaks new ground through a dedicated video-conferencing system – a concept at the heart of the international UNESCO UniTwin, embracing scientists from low-income and distant countries. This book promotes an integrated system of research, education, and training. It also aims at contr...

Online Peer-to-Peer Communities in the Daily Lives of People With Chronic Illness

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kingod, Natasja; Cleal, Bryan; Wahlberg, Ayo

2017-01-01

This qualitative systematic review investigated how individuals with chronic illness experience online peer-to-peer support and how their experiences influence daily life with illness. Selected studies were appraised by quality criteria focused upon research questions and study design, participant...... selection, methods of data collection, and methods of analysis. Four themes were identified: (a) illness-associated identity work, (b) social support and connectivity, (c) experiential knowledge sharing, and (d) collective voice and mobilization. Findings indicate that online peer-to-peer communities...... everyday life with illness. This type of knowledge was perceived as extending far beyond medical care. Online communities were also used to mobilize and raise collective awareness about illness-specific concerns....

Global Learning Communities: A Comparison of Online Domestic and International Science Class Partnerships

Science.gov (United States)

Kerlin, Steven C.; Carlsen, William S.; Kelly, Gregory J.; Goehring, Elizabeth

2013-08-01

The conception of Global Learning Communities (GLCs) was researched to discover potential benefits of the use of online technologies that facilitated communication and scientific data sharing outside of the normal classroom setting. 1,419 students in 635 student groups began the instructional unit. Students represented the classrooms of 33 teachers from the USA, 6 from Thailand, 7 from Australia, and 4 from Germany. Data from an international environmental education project were analyzed to describe grades 7-9 student scientific writing in domestic US versus international-US classroom online partnerships. The development of an argument analytic and a research model of exploratory data analysis followed by statistical testing were used to discover and highlight different ways students used evidence to support their scientific claims about temperature variation at school sites and deep-sea hydrothermal vents. Findings show modest gains in the use of some evidentiary discourse components by US students in international online class partnerships compared to their US counterparts in domestic US partnerships. The analytic, research model, and online collaborative learning tools may be used in other large-scale studies and learning communities. Results provide insights about the benefits of using online technologies and promote the establishment of GLCs.

Feasibility of a UK community-based, eTherapy mental health service in Greater Manchester: repeated-measures and between-groups study of 'Living Life to the Full Interactive', 'Sleepio' and 'Breaking Free Online' at 'Self Help Services'.

Science.gov (United States)

Elison, Sarah; Ward, Jonathan; Williams, Chris; Espie, Colin; Davies, Glyn; Dugdale, Stephanie; Ragan, Kathryn; Chisnall, Leanne; Lidbetter, Nicky; Smith, Keith

2017-07-20

There is increasing evidence to support the effectiveness of eTherapies for mental health, although limited data have been reported from community-based services. Therefore, this service evaluation reports on feasibility and outcomes from an eTherapy mental health service. 'Self Help Services', an Increasing Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) eTherapy service in Greater Manchester. 1068 service users referred to the service for secondary care for their mental health difficulties. Participants were triaged into one of three eTherapy programmes: 'Living Life to the Full Interactive' for low mood, stress and anxiety; 'Sleepio' for insomnia; and 'Breaking Free Online' for substance misuse, depending on clinical need. Standardised psychometric assessments of depression, anxiety and social functioning, collected as part of the IAPT Minimum Data Set, were conducted at baseline and post-treatment. Data indicated baseline differences, with the Breaking Free Online group having higher scores for depression and anxiety than the Living Life to the Full Interactive (depression CI 1.27 to 3.21, pmental health scores were found within all three groups (all pmental health difficulties (pmental health difficulties and suggest that eTherapies may be a useful addition to treatment offering in community-based services. © Article author(s) (or their employer(s) unless otherwise stated in the text of the article) 2017. All rights reserved. No commercial use is permitted unless otherwise expressly granted.

Online community source of new knowledge, practices for Africa's ...

International Development Research Centre (IDRC) Digital Library (Canada)

2016-04-29

Apr 29, 2016 ... Barza, meaning “the place where people in a village meet under a tree to talk and sort out questions concerning the community,” began in 2009 as a project of Farm Radio International (FRI) and the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation. The online network connects rural broadcasters to ...

Leveraging medical taxonomies to improve knowledge management within online communities of practice: The knowledge maps system.

Science.gov (United States)

Stewart, Samuel Alan; Abidi, Syed Sibte Raza

2017-05-01

Online communities of practice contain a wealth of information, stored in the free text of shared communications between community members. The Knowledge Maps (KMaps) system is designed to facilitate Knowledge Translation in online communities through multi-level analyses of the shared messages of these communications. Using state-of-the-art semantic mapping technologies (Metamap) the contents of the messages shared within an online community are mapped to terms from the MeSH medical lexicon, providing a multi-level topic-specific summary of the knowledge being shared within the community. Using the inherent hierarchical structure of the lexicon important insights can be found within the community. The KMaps system was applied to two medical mailing lists, the PPML (archives from 2009-02 to 2013-02) and SURGINET (archives from 2012-01 to 2013-04), identifying 27,924 and 50,597 medical terms respectively. KMaps identified content areas where both communities found interest, specifically around Diseases, 22% and 24% of the total terms, while also identifying field-specific areas that were more popular: SURGINET expressed an interest in Anatomy (14% vs 4%) while the PPML was more interested in Drugs (19% vs 9%). At the level of the individual KMaps identified 6 PPML users and 9 SURGINET users that had noticeably more contributions to the community than their peers, and investigated their personal areas of interest. The KMaps system provides valuable insights into the structure of both communities, identifying topics of interest/shared content areas and defining content-profiles for individual community members. The system provides a valuable addition to the online KT process. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The on-line European Community urgent radiological information exchange (ECURIE) information system

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

De Cort, M.; Breitenbach, L.; De Vries, G.

1998-01-01

Immediately after the accident at the Chernobyl NPP, both the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Commission of the European Communities (CEC) set up a system to meet the requirements for early warning and exchange of information. The Environment Institute of the CEC JRC-Ispra provides technical assistance for the European community Urgent Radiological Information Exchange system (ECURIE). By this system, Member State contact points can exchange information in a coded format. In order to facilitate the use and to assure the data quality, a Coding-Decoding Software (CDS) was developed in collaboration with the I.A.E.A. A new version, called CoDecS, is under development. An ECURIE data bank is under construction, which will automatically recognize and store incoming ECURIE messages. Further on, query and reporting software will be developed. The background objectives and the conceptual basis for the structure of the on-line information system is described. (author)

Metabolic Engineering X Conference

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Flach, Evan [American Institute of Chemical Engineers

2015-05-07

The International Metabolic Engineering Society (IMES) and the Society for Biological Engineering (SBE), both technological communities of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), hosted the Metabolic Engineering X Conference (ME-X) on June 15-19, 2014 at the Westin Bayshore in Vancouver, British Columbia. It attracted 395 metabolic engineers from academia, industry and government from around the globe.

Building Community Consensus for Earth Science Literacy Using an Online Workshop (Invited)

Science.gov (United States)

Wysession, M. E.; Tuddenham, P.; Taber, J.; Ladue, N.

2009-12-01

The Earth Science Literacy Principles, published in the spring of 2009, represented a community consensus about what all Americans should understand about Earth sciences. Central to its creation was a 2-week online workshop that involved participation by 350 Earth scientists and educators. The online workshop, hosted by The College of Exploration, was an excellent medium for incorporating the ideas and concerns of 350 people in near-real time. NSF tasked the Earth Science Literacy Initiative (ESLI) (www.earthscienceliteracy.org) with constructing a set of “Big Ideas” and “Supporting Concepts” that distilled the essential understandings of the GEO-EAR division of NSF. Because of the wide diversity of sub-fields involved (ranging from paleobiology to tectonics), finding a mechanism for incorporating many different views while retaining an organized structure was a challenge. The online workshop turned out to be ideal for this task. Though the 2-week asynchronous workshop was designed to replicate a 2-day in-person workshop, at the drawn-out pace of one hour of requested participation per day, in reality it was much more productive. Many aspects of an in-person workshop were replicated in the the online space. Plenary talks were presented in the main conference room via videos recorded just before or during the 2-week period. The workshop was structured with 150 invited participants and 200 observers. The participants had access to all of the rooms while the observers could see all rooms but could only chat in their own area, the Observation Café. Each breakout room had a moderator who attempted to guide discussion, including suggesting off-topic conversations be moved to the Earth Café. An organizing committee of about a dozen people teleconferenced daily, determining the goals or tasks for the participants for that day. This allowed for a high level of flexibility, with the workshop structure flowing in response to the results up to that point. The first

Followers are not enough: a multifaceted approach to community detection in online social networks.

Science.gov (United States)

Darmon, David; Omodei, Elisa; Garland, Joshua

2015-01-01

In online social media networks, individuals often have hundreds or even thousands of connections, which link these users not only to friends, associates, and colleagues, but also to news outlets, celebrities, and organizations. In these complex social networks, a 'community' as studied in the social network literature, can have very different meaning depending on the property of the network under study. Taking into account the multifaceted nature of these networks, we claim that community detection in online social networks should also be multifaceted in order to capture all of the different and valuable viewpoints of 'community.' In this paper we focus on three types of communities beyond follower-based structural communities: activity-based, topic-based, and interaction-based. We analyze a Twitter dataset using three different weightings of the structural network meant to highlight these three community types, and then infer the communities associated with these weightings. We show that interesting insights can be obtained about the complex community structure present in social networks by studying when and how these four community types give rise to similar as well as completely distinct community structure.

Designscholar: Examining Creative Thinking in an Online Learning Community for Interior Design Graduate Students

Science.gov (United States)

Ransdell, Marlo Evelyn

2009-01-01

This study examined the creative thinking of interior design graduate students in an online learning community. This study considered potential changes in creative thinking (fluency, flexibility, originality, and elaboration) about design research resulting from peer-led online discussions. It further studied the learner characteristics of…

Engineering Hybrid Learning Communities: The Case of a Regional Parent Community

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sven Strickroth

2014-09-01

Full Text Available We present an approach (and a corresponding system design for supporting regionally bound hybrid learning communities (i.e., communities which combine traditional face-to-face elements with web based media such as online community platforms, e-mail and SMS newsletters. The goal of the example community used to illustrate the approach was to support and motivate (especially hard-to-reach underprivileged parents in the education of their young children. The article describes the design process used and the challenges faced during the socio-technical system design. An analysis of the community over more than one year indicates that the hybrid approach works better than the two separated “traditional” approaches separately. Synergy effects like advertising effects from the offline trainings for the online platform and vice versa occurred and regular newsletters turned out to have a noticeable effect on the community.

Sustaining an Online, Shared Community Resource for Models, Robust Open source Software Tools and Data for Volcanology - the Vhub Experience

Science.gov (United States)

Patra, A. K.; Valentine, G. A.; Bursik, M. I.; Connor, C.; Connor, L.; Jones, M.; Simakov, N.; Aghakhani, H.; Jones-Ivey, R.; Kosar, T.; Zhang, B.

2015-12-01

Over the last 5 years we have created a community collaboratory Vhub.org [Palma et al, J. App. Volc. 3:2 doi:10.1186/2191-5040-3-2] as a place to find volcanology-related resources, and a venue for users to disseminate tools, teaching resources, data, and an online platform to support collaborative efforts. As the community (current active users > 6000 from an estimated community of comparable size) embeds the tools in the collaboratory into educational and research workflows it became imperative to: a) redesign tools into robust, open source reusable software for online and offline usage/enhancement; b) share large datasets with remote collaborators and other users seamlessly with security; c) support complex workflows for uncertainty analysis, validation and verification and data assimilation with large data. The focus on tool development/redevelopment has been twofold - firstly to use best practices in software engineering and new hardware like multi-core and graphic processing units. Secondly we wish to enhance capabilities to support inverse modeling, uncertainty quantification using large ensembles and design of experiments, calibration, validation. Among software engineering practices we practice are open source facilitating community contributions, modularity and reusability. Our initial targets are four popular tools on Vhub - TITAN2D, TEPHRA2, PUFF and LAVA. Use of tools like these requires many observation driven data sets e.g. digital elevation models of topography, satellite imagery, field observations on deposits etc. These data are often maintained in private repositories that are privately shared by "sneaker-net". As a partial solution to this we tested mechanisms using irods software for online sharing of private data with public metadata and access limits. Finally, we adapted use of workflow engines (e.g. Pegasus) to support the complex data and computing workflows needed for usage like uncertainty quantification for hazard analysis using physical

Proceedings of the 7. world wind energy conference 2008 : community power : energy autonomy for local economies

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2008-01-01

This international conference profiled the topic of community power within the dynamic renewable energy sector. The objective was to promote international technology transfer and bring a new perspective to community development, economic growth and environmental awareness in the context of climate change. It was attended by academics and industry representatives from 20 countries who focused on leading edge research on the topic of innovative technology in the rapidly growing renewable power market. The topics of discussion addressed issues such as ownership of renewable energy projects by local communities, including farmers, landowners, cooperatives, Aboriginal groups, municipalities, utilities and educational institutions. Presentations focused on policy development, financial mechanisms, ownership models, technology advancements, grid interconnection issues, governance and capacity building. The conference featured more than 100 presentations, of which 65 have been catalogued separately for inclusion in this database. refs., tabs., figs

Understanding consumer motivations for interacting in online food communities – potential for innovation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jacobsen, Lina; Sørensen, Bjarne Taulo; Tudoran, Ana Alina

This study contributes to the understanding of online user communities as a potential source of innovation. That would require an interest from users in interacting in such communities. In order to establish interaction, users must provide as well as consume information. However, depending...... on the innovation task, one may be more important than the other. It is therefore important to understand, how companies can increase user willingness to engage in these different interaction forms. This study investigates the influence of various motivation factors and user interests on intention to provide...... or consume information in online food communities. A survey was conducted among 1009 respondents followed by analysis based on Structural Equation Modelling. Results revealed the effect of motivation factors to be stronger than basic consumer interests indicating that companies can influence the intended...

Social and place-focused communities in location-based online social networks

Science.gov (United States)

Brown, Chloë; Nicosia, Vincenzo; Scellato, Salvatore; Noulas, Anastasios; Mascolo, Cecilia

2013-06-01

Thanks to widely available, cheap Internet access and the ubiquity of smartphones, millions of people around the world now use online location-based social networking services. Understanding the structural properties of these systems and their dependence upon users' habits and mobility has many potential applications, including resource recommendation and link prediction. Here, we construct and characterise social and place-focused graphs by using longitudinal information about declared social relationships and about users' visits to physical places collected from a popular online location-based social service. We show that although the social and place-focused graphs are constructed from the same data set, they have quite different structural properties. We find that the social and location-focused graphs have different global and meso-scale structure, and in particular that social and place-focused communities have negligible overlap. Consequently, group inference based on community detection performed on the social graph alone fails to isolate place-focused groups, even though these do exist in the network. By studying the evolution of tie structure within communities, we show that the time period over which location data are aggregated has a substantial impact on the stability of place-focused communities, and that information about place-based groups may be more useful for user-centric applications than that obtained from the analysis of social communities alone.

4th IUPAP International Conference on Women in Physics

Indian Academy of Sciences (India)

Accommodation will be available on-site at the Protea Hotel Stellenbosch and can be reserved through the. Conference Organiser via the on-line registration form. Flights, car rentals, sightseeing tours and pre/post conference accommodation can be reserved with the Conference & Travel Organisers, African Conferences.

When Disney Meets the Research Park: Metaphors and Models for Engineering an Online Learning Community of Tomorrow

Science.gov (United States)

Chenail, Ronald J.

2004-01-01

It is suggested that educators look to an environment in which qualitative research can be learned in more flexible and creative ways--an online learning community known as the Research Park Online (RPO). This model, based upon Walt Disney's 1966 plan for his "Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow" (EPCOT) and university cooperative…

Tacit Knowledge in Online Learning: Community, Identity, and Social Capital

Science.gov (United States)

Oztok, Murat

2013-01-01

This article discusses the possibilities that tacit knowledge could provide for social constructivist pedagogies; in particular, pedagogies for online learning. Arguing that the tacit dimension of knowledge is critical for meaning making in situated learning practices and for a community of practice to function, the article considers whether…

Self-identity and regulatory focus in governance of online communities

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Li-Ying, Jason

A fast growing stream of literature has shown tremendous interests in the ‘wisdom of crowds’, which is embedded in various forms of online communities (OCs). However, studies on the governance of OCs are rather scattered. Our knowledge on how key governance mechanisms are interrelated is very much...

A Santa Sé e a Conferência de Helsinque

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Virgílio Caixeta Arraes

2011-02-01

Full Text Available A presente exposição busca, brevemente, estudar a atuação da Santa Sé durante a Conferência de Helsinque e analisar a diplomacia pontifica durante esse período da Guerra Fria.

The cathedral and the bazaar of e-repository development: encouraging community engagement with moving pictures and sound

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Denis Wong

2008-12-01

Full Text Available This paper offers an insight into the development, use and governance of e-repositories for learning and teaching, illustrated by Eric Raymond's bazaar and cathedral analogies and by a comparison of collection strategies that focus on content coverage or on the needs of users. It addresses in particular the processes that encourage and achieve community engagement. This insight is illustrated by one particular e-repository, the Education Media On-Line (EMOL service. This paper draws analogies between the bazaar approach for open source software development and its possibilities for developing e-repositories for learning and teaching. It suggests in particular that the development, use and evaluation of online moving pictures and sound objects for learning and teaching can benefit greatly from the community engagement lessons provided by the development, use and evaluation of open source software. Such lessons can be underpinned by experience in the area of learning resource collections, where repositories have been classified as ‘collections-based' or ‘user-based'. Lessons from the open source movement may inform the development of e-repositories such as EMOL in the future.

Nursing Community 2.0: a method to promote online collaborative learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Maura I. Cascio

2016-07-01

qualitative and quantitative analysis of online interactions. Results indicate that, thanks to the deployment of suitable technology and expert tutor support, Nursing Community 2.0 has successfully established itself as an environment for generating and exchanging knowledge.

Experience of e-learning implementation through massive open online courses

Science.gov (United States)

Ivleva, N. V.; Fibikh, E. V.

2016-04-01

E-learning is considered to be one of the most prospective directions in education development worldwide. To have a competitive advantage over other institutions offering a wide variety of educational services it is important to introduce information and communication technologies into the educational process to develop e-learning on the whole. The aim of the research is to reveal problems which prevent from full implementation of e-learning at the Reshetnev Siberian State Aerospace University (SibSAU) and to suggest ways on solving those problems through optimization of e-learning introduction process at the university by motivating students and teaching staff to participate in massive open online courses and formation of tailored platforms with the view to arrange similar courses at the premises of the university. The paper considers the introduction and development level of e-learning in Russia and at SibSAU particularly. It substantiates necessity to accelerate e-learning introduction process at an aerospace university as a base for training of highly-qualified specialists in the area of aviation, machine building, physics, info-communication technologies and also in other scientific areas within which university training is carried out. The paper covers SibSAU’s experience in e-learning implementation in the educational process through students and teaching staff participation in massive open online courses and mastering other up-to-date and trendy educational platforms and their usage in the educational process. Key words. E-learning, distance learning, online learning, massive open online course.

Online Behavior Analysis-Based Student Profile for Intelligent E-Learning

OpenAIRE

Liang, Kun; Zhang, Yiying; He, Yeshen; Zhou, Yilin; Tan, Wei; Li, Xiaoxia

2017-01-01

With the development of mobile platform, such as smart cellphone and pad, the E-Learning model has been rapidly developed. However, due to the low completion rate for E-Learning platform, it is very necessary to analyze the behavior characteristics of online learners to intelligently adjust online education strategy and enhance the quality of learning. In this paper, we analyzed the relation indicators of E-Learning to build the student profile and gave countermeasures. Adopting the similarit...

The effect of computer-mediated social support in online communities on patient empowerment and doctor-patient communication.

Science.gov (United States)

Oh, Hyun Jung; Lee, Byoungkwan

2012-01-01

In the context of diabetes, this study tested a mechanism through which Korean diabetes patients' exchange of computer-mediated social support (CMSS) in diabetes online communities influences their sense of empowerment and intention to actively communicate with the doctor. Analysis of data from 464 Korean diabetes patients indicates significant relationships among diabetes patients' online community activities, perceived CMSS, sense of empowerment, and their intention to actively communicate with the doctor. Diabetes patients who have engaged more in online community activities perceived greater social support from other members of the community. Perceived CMSS significantly predicted their intention to actively communicate with the doctor through sense of empowerment. Sense of empowerment was a valid underlying mechanism that explains how patients' perceived CMSS influences their intention to actively communicate with the doctor. The implications for health communication research and practice are discussed.

Second European Conference on Unsaturated Soils, E-UNSAT 2012

CERN Document Server

Jommi, Cristina; D’Onza, Francesca; Unsaturated Soils: Research and Applications

2012-01-01

These volumes contain the contributions to the Second European Conference on Unsaturated Soils, E-UNSAT 2012, held in Napoli, Italy, in June 2012. The event is the second of a series of European conferences, and follows the first successful one, organised in Durham, UK, in 2008. The conference series is supported by Technical Committee 106 of the International Society of Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering on Unsaturated Soils. The published contributions were selected after a careful peer-review process. A collection of more than one hundred papers is included, addressing the three thematic areas experimental, including advances in testing techniques and soil behaviour, modelling, covering theoretical and constitutive issues together with numerical and physical modelling, and engineering, focusing on approaches, case histories and geo-environmental themes. The areas of application of the papers embrace most of the geotechnical problems related to unsaturated soils. Increasing interest in geo-environm...

User-Generated Content, YouTube and Participatory Culture on the Web: Music Learning and Teaching in Two Contrasting Online Communities

Science.gov (United States)

Waldron, Janice

2013-01-01

In this paper, I draw on seminal literature from new media researchers to frame the broader implications that user-generated content (UGC), YouTube, and participatory culture have for music learning and teaching in online communities; to illustrate, I use examples from two contrasting online music communities, the Online Academy of Irish…

The online Self

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Gloerich, I.; van Dipten, L.; Rasch, M.D.

2017-01-01

Following the conference Fear and Loathing of the Online Self and the publication of Culture of the Selfie: Self-Representation in Contemporary Visual Culture in May 2017, this episode of INC’s Zero Infinite podcast zooms in on the online self and selfies, with Ana Peraica, Wendy Chun and Rebecca

Strategies, Research Priorities, and Partnerships for Community IPM to Prevent Tick-Borne Diseases--2011 Conference

Science.gov (United States)

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) held the Promoting Community Integrated Pest Management to Prevent Tick-Borne Diseases Conference on March 30th and 31st, 2011 in Arlington, Virginia. Read the meeting summary.

Study on online community user motif using web usage mining

Science.gov (United States)

Alphy, Meera; Sharma, Ajay

2016-04-01

The Web usage mining is the application of data mining, which is used to extract useful information from the online community. The World Wide Web contains at least 4.73 billion pages according to Indexed Web and it contains at least 228.52 million pages according Dutch Indexed web on 6th august 2015, Thursday. It’s difficult to get needed data from these billions of web pages in World Wide Web. Here is the importance of web usage mining. Personalizing the search engine helps the web user to identify the most used data in an easy way. It reduces the time consumption; automatic site search and automatic restore the useful sites. This study represents the old techniques to latest techniques used in pattern discovery and analysis in web usage mining from 1996 to 2015. Analyzing user motif helps in the improvement of business, e-commerce, personalisation and improvement of websites.

Pengaruh persepsi resiko dan kualitas e-commerce terhadap keputusan konsumen membeli fashion online

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lucky Lhaura Van FC

2017-11-01

Full Text Available AbstrakPenelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui pengaruh persepsi konsumen tentang resiko terhadap keputusan pembelian produk fashion toko online ,kedua pengaruh media e-Commerce terhadap keputusan pembelian produk fashion.. pengaruh persepsi konsumen tentang resiko dan kualitas pelayanan secara bersama-sama terhadap keputusan pembelian produk fashion toko online , penelitian ini termasuk penelitian kuantitatif. Populasi penelitian adalah mahasiswa/wi dan dosen fakultas Ilmu Komputer yang pernah melakukan pembelian online. Pengumpulan data dilakukan dengan angket ,dimana analisis data menggunakan metode non probability sampling yang telah didapat sebanyak 110 sampel penelitian,  analisis data menggunakan fitur cronbach’s alfa.Hasil dari pPeneltian ini adalah sSemakin rendah resiko yang dipersepsikan oleh konsumen, maka semakin tinggi tingkat keputusan konsumen untuk membeli fashion secara online. Semakin berkualitas pelayanan e-commerce yang disediakan para pengelola situs belanja fashion online, maka semakin tinggi tingkat keputusan konsumen untuk membeli fashion secara online. Rendahnya persepsi resiko dan tingginya kualitas pelayanan elektronik secara bersamaan akan mampu meningkatkan keputusan konsumen untuk membeli fashion secara online. Kata Kunci : Persepsi Resiko, kualitas e-commerce, metode non probability sampling, cronbach’s alfa  AbstractThis research is perceived risk and quality of e-commerce on fashion product online buying decision in faculty of Computer Science  . This study includes quantitative research. The population of research is students  and faculty lecturer of Computer Science who ever made online purchasing. Data collection is done by questionnaire, where data analysis using non probabity sampling method has been obtained as many as 110 research samples, data analysis using cronbach's alpha feature. Result from Peneltian This is the lower the risk perceived by the consumer, the higher the level of consumer

Finding the community in sustainable online community engagement: Not-for-profit organisation websites, service-learning and research

OpenAIRE

Dodd, Alice

2017-01-01

This article explores the use of action research (2008–2014) based on a case study of the Sustainable Online Community Engagement (SOCE) Project, a service-learning project in which University of South Australia students build websites for not-for-profit (NFP) organisations, to demonstrate that effective teaching, public service and research are interdependent. A significant problem experienced in the SOCE project was that, despite some training and ongoing assistance, the community organisat...

Structuring oil and gas joint ventures with aboriginal communities: conference papers conference

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1999-01-01

The Insight Conference featured twelve articles on the following topics: 1 - researching and understanding your legal partners; II - an aboriginal game plan - a plan for success; III - legal and management issues relating to aboriginal ventures; IV - tax status of reserve-based aboriginal people and businesses under the Indian Act; v - first nations as exempt bodies under the Income Tax Act; V I - innovative options for structuring oil and gas leases and exploration permits on aboriginal lands; VII - joint venture and partnership arrangements; V III - the impact of taxation on aboriginal ventures; I X - bankruptcy and insolvency issues for on-reserve businesses; X - financing options for oil and gas ventures with first nations; XI - Syncrude's commitment to aboriginal development; and X II - structuring oil and gas ventures with aboriginal communities. Articles abstracted/indexed separately include: I, II, V I (2), V III, X, XI, and X II

EXPERIÊNCIA AMOROSA ON-LINE E NARRATIVA

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Vergas Vitória Andrade da Silva

2014-01-01

Full Text Available This article aims to acknowledge the virtual dating phenomenon through the eyes of contemporary philosophy. The research deals with this phenomenon in Orkut, a social networking website. Thus, it considers debates and forums that were present in a Brazilian Orkut online community called Conheci meu amor pela internet (I met my love through the Internet. Empirical analysis demonstrates that these forums and polls present themselves as a social phenomenon that allows a particular form of self presentation on the internet. In orderfor these subjects to present themselves they built their own self narratives. What is possible to acknowledge considering these narratives is that there is a predominance of the element of intrigue that is further solved and demonstrate a satisfactory result. These narrators then choose online dating situation that present happy endings and happiness that are associated to romantic ideals that are worthwhile being shown. The contents present in these narratives are dealt with by the research. Thus, this work defends the thesis that the online dating narratives are a mixture of facts and fiction once all experiences deal with romantic imaginary as well as personal dating experience. Thus, the research is an attempt to understand what goes on the forums and debates that deal with the fictionalized and dramatized daily experiences in the performances that are similar to games. This is possible due to the fact that there is use of romantic fables and concrete experiences realized by online dating.

Nursing and Twitter: creating an online community using hashtags.

Science.gov (United States)

Moorley, Calvin R; Chinn, Teresa

2014-01-01

Social media is becoming a facet of our lives and a tool for connecting, uniting and supporting people. Its use is growing in nursing, medical and health settings. This article describes the process, development and growth of an online community to connect nurses via Twitter using hashtags. Data was analysed to identify the benefits, barriers and enablers for the creation of an online nursing community. Methods consisted of key word searches in Twitter relevant to nursing, visits to the WeNurses website and tracking the number of followers on the website. A social media monitoring tool (SM2) was used to monitor visibility to establish baseline data and identify trends. WeNurses was launched in July 2012 and has over 7000 followers. Visits to the website are between 500 and 1500 each day. The use of a systematic nursing approach including the key principles of both nursing and social media (honesty, transparency, listening and reacting) helped to create and develop an online nursing community. It was found that WeNurses provides a platform for nurses to discuss issues in nursing, or complain about reforms. Nurses are free to question on how they can improve skills and contemplate their understanding of changes in the health service. Enablers included a committed group who openly discussed their thoughts, opinions and practices, a shared identity, an understanding each other's perspective and ownership by members. Using a nursing framework in a digital space added a unique dimension that resonated with members and provided a structured approach to the project. Nurses have begun to not only embrace social media but also use it for their own development. Health employers also need to encourage use of social media to help develop expertise, experience and knowledge in nurses and nursing practice. Social media can provide a social and professional space for nurses, and has potential to influence the health and wellness of different population groups involved in both

Othering in Online Learning: An Examination of Social Presence, Identity, and Sense of Community

Science.gov (United States)

Phirangee, Krystle; Malec, Alesia

2017-01-01

Fostering a strong sense of community among students in online courses is the goal of many instructors because it is seen as being essential in supporting students' learning experiences. However, high dropout rates in online learning suggest that students feel disconnected and isolated from their course, feelings which have been attributed to the…

The influence of an online virtual situated environment on a Chinese learning community

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kuo-En Chang

2012-03-01

Full Text Available This study used an online virtual environment to create and develop a Chinese learning community. The purposes of research were (1 to enhance the Chinese learners’ oral Chinese communication skills and (2 to change the community members’ Chinese speaking and teaching behavior. This is an action research. The research tried to create a community in a virtual environment. The research results showed that (1 a virtual community can enhance learner’s Chinese competence, and (2 future Chinese teachers’ instructional and leading skills can be developed in a virtual community situation.

Sharing best practices through online communities of practice: a case study

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Johnson Peter

2010-11-01

Full Text Available Abstract Introduction The USAID-funded Capacity Project established the Global Alliance for Pre-Service Education (GAPS to provide an online forum to discuss issues related to teaching and acquiring competence in family planning, with a focus on developing countries' health related training institutions. The success of the Global Alliance for Nursing and Midwifery's ongoing web-based community of practice (CoP provided a strong example of the successful use of this medium to reach many participants in a range of settings. Case description GAPS functioned as a moderated set of forums that were analyzed by a small group of experts in family planning and pre-service education from three organizations. The cost of the program included the effort provided by the moderators and the time to administer responses and conduct the analysis. Discussion and evaluation Family planning is still considered a minor topic in health related training institutions. Rather than focusing solely on family planning competencies, GAPS members suggested a focus on several professional competencies (e.g. communication, leadership, cultural sensitivity, teamwork and problem solving that would enhance the resulting health care graduate's ability to operate in a complex health environment. Resources to support competency-based education in the academic setting must be sufficient and appropriately distributed. Where clinical competencies are incorporated into pre-service education, responsible faculty and preceptors must be clinically proficient. The interdisciplinary GAPS memberships allowed for a comparison and contrast of competencies, opportunities, promising practices, documents, lessons learned and key teaching strategies. Conclusions Online CoPs are a useful interface for connecting developing country experiences. From CoPs, we may uncover challenges and opportunities that are faced in the absorption of key public health competencies required for decreasing maternal

Sharing best practices through online communities of practice: a case study.

Science.gov (United States)

Thomas, Annamma Udaya; Fried, Grace P; Johnson, Peter; Stilwell, Barbara J

2010-11-12

The USAID-funded Capacity Project established the Global Alliance for Pre-Service Education (GAPS) to provide an online forum to discuss issues related to teaching and acquiring competence in family planning, with a focus on developing countries' health related training institutions. The success of the Global Alliance for Nursing and Midwifery's ongoing web-based community of practice (CoP) provided a strong example of the successful use of this medium to reach many participants in a range of settings. GAPS functioned as a moderated set of forums that were analyzed by a small group of experts in family planning and pre-service education from three organizations. The cost of the program included the effort provided by the moderators and the time to administer responses and conduct the analysis. Family planning is still considered a minor topic in health related training institutions. Rather than focusing solely on family planning competencies, GAPS members suggested a focus on several professional competencies (e.g. communication, leadership, cultural sensitivity, teamwork and problem solving) that would enhance the resulting health care graduate's ability to operate in a complex health environment. Resources to support competency-based education in the academic setting must be sufficient and appropriately distributed. Where clinical competencies are incorporated into pre-service education, responsible faculty and preceptors must be clinically proficient. The interdisciplinary GAPS memberships allowed for a comparison and contrast of competencies, opportunities, promising practices, documents, lessons learned and key teaching strategies. Online CoPs are a useful interface for connecting developing country experiences. From CoPs, we may uncover challenges and opportunities that are faced in the absorption of key public health competencies required for decreasing maternal mortality and morbidity. Use of the World Health Organization (WHO) Implementing Best Practices

Barriers and facilitators for the implementation of an online clinical health community in addition to usual fertility care: a cross-sectional study.

Science.gov (United States)

Aarts, Johanna W M; Faber, Marjan J; den Boogert, Anne G; Cohlen, Ben J; van der Linden, Paul J Q; Kremer, Jan A M; Nelen, Willianne L D M

2013-08-30

Online health communities are becoming more popular in health care. Patients and professionals can communicate with one another online, patients can find peer support, and professionals can use it as an additional information channel to their patients. However, the implementation of online health communities into daily practice is challenging. These challenges relate to the fact that patients need to be activated to (1) become a member (ie, subscription) and (2) participate actively within the community before any effect can be expected. Therefore, we aimed at answering 2 research questions: (1) what factors are associated with subscription to an online health community, and (2) which are associated with becoming an active participant within an online health community. To identify barriers and facilitators as perceived by patients for the implementation of an online health community. We performed a cross-sectional study. Three Dutch fertility clinics (2 IVF-licensed) offered their patients a secure online clinical health community through which clinicians can provide online information and patients can ask questions to the medical team or share experiences and find support from peers. We randomly selected and invited 278 men and women suffering from infertility and attending 1 of the participating clinics. Participants filled out a questionnaire about their background characteristics and current use of the online community. Possible barriers and facilitators were divided into 2 parts: (1) those for subscription to the community, and (2) those for active participation in the community. We performed 2 multivariate logistic regression analyses to calculate determinants for both subscription and active participation. Subscription appeared to be associated with patients' background characteristics (eg, gender, treatment phase), intervention-related facilitators (odds ratio [OR] 2.45, 95% CI 1.14-5.27), and patient-related barriers (OR 0.20, 95% CI 0.08-0.54), such as

Establishment of a Hub for the Light Water Reactor Sustainability Online Monitoring Community

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lybeck, Nancy J.; Tawfik, Magdy S.; Pham, Binh T.

2011-01-01

Implementation of online monitoring and prognostics in existing U.S. nuclear power plants will involve coordinating the efforts of national laboratories, utilities, universities, and private companies. Internet-based collaborative work environments provide necessary communication tools to facilitate interaction between geographically diverse participants. Available technologies were considered, and a collaborative workspace was established at INL as a hub for the light water reactor sustainability online monitoring community.

School Teacher Professional Development in Online Communities of Practice:A Systematic Literature Review

OpenAIRE

Khalid, Md. Saifuddin; Strange, Majbrit Højland

2016-01-01

This study informs researchers of educational technology, teachers, teacher associations and moderators or admins of online platforms who are interested in knowledge sharing among teachers within online communities of practice (CoPs). The continuous professional development of teachers is primarily about improving their teaching practice. It includes both formal and informal learning activities to transform attitudes, behaviour, skills and knowledge. Formal knowledge sharing methods like trai...

Building Community: A 2005 Conference for Education and Public Outreach Professionals

Science.gov (United States)

Slater, T. F.; Bennett, M.; Garmany, K.

2004-12-01

In support of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific's (ASP) mission to increase the understanding and appreciation of astronomy, the ASP will host an international meeting in September 14-16, 2005 in Tucson focused on building and supporting a vibrant and connected community of individuals and groups engaged in educational and public outreach (EPO) in the disciplines of astronomy, astrobiology, space, and earth science. This conference is specially designed for individuals who are bringing the excitement of astronomy to non-astronomers. This community of science communicators includes: NASA and NSF-funded EPO program managers, developers, evaluators, PIOs, and others who support outreach efforts by government agencies and commercial industries; Scientists working with or assigned to EPO programs or efforts; Individuals working in formal science education: K-14 schools/colleges and minority-serving institutions as faculty or curriculum developers; Informal educators working in widely diverse settings including science centers, planetariums, museums, parks, and youth programs; Amateur astronomers involved in or interested in engaging children and adults in the excitement of astronomy; Public outreach specialists working in observatories, visitor centers, public information offices, and in multimedia broadcasting and journalism. The conference goals are to improve the quality and increase the effective dissemination of EPO materials, products, and programs through a multi-tiered professional development conference utilizing: Visionary plenary talks; Highly interactive panel discussions; Small group workshops and clinics focused on a wide range of EPO topics including evaluation and dissemination, with separate sessions for varying experience levels; Poster and project exhibition segments; Opportunities to increase program leveraging through structured and unstructured networking sessions; and Individual program action planning sessions. There will both separate and

Online learning management systems (LMS and sense of community: A pre-service practicum perspective

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Glenn Rideout

2008-05-01

Full Text Available This paper examines the impact of the implementation of an online learning management system (LMS on pre-service teachers during their major pre-service practicum. The LMS enabled students to remain connected to peers, professors, and supervisors while new relationships were formed with in-school personnel such as mentor teachers, principals, and students. The quantitative data analysis revealed that pre-service teachers perceived a higher sense of community when it included pre-service teachers only than when it included teaching faculty and part-time practicum supervisors. The online LMS was identified as the best predictor of a sense of community among pre-service teachers, when compared to other variables, and not a significant predictor when community included part-time practicum supervisors. The paper concludes with an examination of the perspectives of provincial Ministries of Education and Teachers Federations in relation to the role and evaluation of educational technology initiatives. Résumé: Cet article examine l’impact de l’implantation d’une plateforme eLearning (LMS sur de futurs enseignants en stage. La plateforme a permis aux étudiants de rester en contact avec leurs pairs, leur professeurs et leurs superviseurs, alors que de nouvelles relations se formaient avec la collectivité de l’école les accueillant pour leur stage (mentor, directeur d’école et élèves. L’analyse des données quantitatives a révélé que les futurs enseignants percevaient un meilleur esprit communautaire quand seuls les futurs enseignants en faisaient partie par opposition à une communauté composée des futurs enseignants, des professeurs de leur programme et les superviseurs à temps partiel de leur stage. La plateforme LMS a été identifiée comme le meilleur prédicteur de l’esprit communautaire chez les futurs enseignants par comparaison avec d’autres variables, et un prédicteur non significatif quand la communauté incluait

Structuring joint ventures and resource development arrangements between Aboriginal communities and the petroleum industry : Proceedings of an Insight Conference

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1998-01-01

The 15 presentations at this conference focused on the structuring of joint ventures with the petroleum industry and First Nations communities in the wake of the recent Delgamuukw decision of the Supreme Court of Canada, issued in December 1997. This decision asserted the right of Aboriginal communities to exclusive use and occupation of their land. The decision has created an urgent need to re-examine business relationships with Aboriginal communities and led to an increase in interest by resource industry people in Aboriginal practices, customs and traditions. Accordingly, speakers at this conference explored the consequences of self government by native communities, native cultural issues that influence the way Aboriginal people conduct business and the effect of the Supreme Court decision on land use planning in the resource-rich provinces of Canada. refs., tabs., figs

Automatic topic identification of health-related messages in online health community using text classification.

Science.gov (United States)

Lu, Yingjie

2013-01-01

To facilitate patient involvement in online health community and obtain informative support and emotional support they need, a topic identification approach was proposed in this paper for identifying automatically topics of the health-related messages in online health community, thus assisting patients in reaching the most relevant messages for their queries efficiently. Feature-based classification framework was presented for automatic topic identification in our study. We first collected the messages related to some predefined topics in a online health community. Then we combined three different types of features, n-gram-based features, domain-specific features and sentiment features to build four feature sets for health-related text representation. Finally, three different text classification techniques, C4.5, Naïve Bayes and SVM were adopted to evaluate our topic classification model. By comparing different feature sets and different classification techniques, we found that n-gram-based features, domain-specific features and sentiment features were all considered to be effective in distinguishing different types of health-related topics. In addition, feature reduction technique based on information gain was also effective to improve the topic classification performance. In terms of classification techniques, SVM outperformed C4.5 and Naïve Bayes significantly. The experimental results demonstrated that the proposed approach could identify the topics of online health-related messages efficiently.

A urinary incontinence continuing education online course for community health nurses in South Korea.

Science.gov (United States)

De Gagne, Jennie C; Park, Sunah; So, Aeyoung; Wu, Bei; Palmer, Mary H; McConnell, Eleanor S

2015-04-01

Although urinary incontinence is prevalent among older women living in rural Korea, a lack of awareness and education exists in this population and among health professionals. Geographic isolation and limited resources also contribute to having few educational offerings for rural nurses. The authors' aim was to develop an online continuing education course on continence care for community health nurses and to examine its effectiveness. A one-group, pretest-posttest design was used to detect changes in knowledge and attitudes after taking the online education course. Participant satisfaction was also measured at the end of the training. A significant improvement in knowledge and attitudes toward continence care was noted. More than 95% of participants responded that they would recommend the online program to other health care providers and indicated the program would be helpful regarding continence care in their practice. The continuing education online course is a feasible strategy to support rural community health nurses' learning to improve knowledge and attitudes toward urinary incontinence management and care. Copyright 2015, SLACK Incorporated.

Integrating E-Learning 2.0 into Online Courses

Science.gov (United States)

Yuen, Steve Chi-Yin

2014-01-01

This paper provides an overview of e-learning 2.0 concepts and presents a case study that involves the design, development, and teaching of two online courses based on e-learning 2.0 concepts. The design and the construction of e-learning 2.0 courses, and their effects on the students' learning experience are examined. In addition, students'…

SAIChE Conference Poster: Irradiation treatment of dissolving pulps produced in South Africa

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Ocwelwang, A

2014-07-01

Full Text Available stream_source_info Ocwelwang_2014_ABSTRACT.pdf.txt stream_content_type text/plain stream_size 876 Content-Encoding ISO-8859-1 stream_name Ocwelwang_2014_ABSTRACT.pdf.txt Content-Type text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 2014... International Conference on Chemical Thermodynamics and South African Institution of Chemical Engineering Conference, Durban, South Africa, 27 July - 1 August 2014 SAIChE Conference Poster: Irradiation treatment of dissolving pulps produced in South...

Patterns of behavior in an online community

Science.gov (United States)

Gallos, Lazaros; Rybski, Diego; Liljeros, Fredrik; Havlin, Shlomo; Makse, Hernan

2009-03-01

Human behavior can be seen as the expression of inherent motives. Despite the diverse range of these motives, social theorists have long identified a small number of distinct underlying mechanisms, where, consciously or unconsciously, every individual tries to exploit a different aspect of social interactions and/or optimize the efficiency of certain procedures for the benefit of the society or for personal gain. Here we show that users in an online community follow certain behavioral patterns and the choice of their favorite members is far from a random process. More importantly, these patterns are systematically modified with time as a member becomes more involved in such a community. We are able to identify a crossover in the average behavior of the members when their favorites list exceeds roughly 10 favorites. Additionally, this process allows us to identify individuals with a markedly different behavior than the average person. This study can help us understand the process of establishing friendships and the motives behind this process.

Understanding Motivations and User Interests as Antecedents for Different Interaction Forms in Online Communities

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jacobsen, Lina; Sørensen, Bjarne Taulo; Tudoran, Ana Alina

This study contributes to the understanding of online user communities as a potential source of innovation. That would require an interest from users in interacting in such communities. In order to establish interaction, users must provide as well as consume information. However, depending...... on the innovation task, one may be more important than the other. It is therefore important to understand, how companies can increase user willingness to engage in these different interaction forms. This study investigates the influence of various motivation factors and user interests on intention to provide...... or consume information in online food communities. A survey was conducted among 1009 respondents followed by analysis based on Structural Equation Modelling. Results revealed the effect of motivation factors to be stronger than basic consumer interests indicating that companies can influence the intended...

From Help-Seekers to Influential Users: A Systematic Review of Participation Styles in Online Health Communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Carron-Arthur, Bradley; Ali, Kathina; Cunningham, John Alastair; Griffiths, Kathleen Margaret

2015-12-01

Understanding how people participate in and contribute to online health communities (OHCs) is useful knowledge in multiple domains. It is helpful for community managers in developing strategies for building community, for organizations in disseminating information about health interventions, and for researchers in understanding the social dynamics of peer support. We sought to determine if any patterns were apparent in the nature of user participation across online health communities. The current study involved a systematic review of all studies that have investigated the nature of participation in an online health community and have provided a quantifiable method for categorizing a person based on their participation style. A systematic search yielded 20 papers. Participatory styles were classified as either multidimensional (based on multiple metrics) or unidimensional (based on one metric). With respect to the multidimensional category, a total of 41 different participation styles were identified ranging from Influential Users who were leaders on the board to Topic-Focused Responders who focused on a specific topic and tended to respond to rather than initiate posts. However, there was little overlap in participation styles identified both across OHCs for different health conditions and within OHCs for specific health conditions. Five of the 41 styles emerged in more than one study (Hubs, Authorities, Facilitators, Prime Givers, and Discussants), but the remainder were reported in only one study. The focus of the unidimensional studies was on level of engagement and particularly on high-engaged users. Eight different metrics were used to evaluate level of engagement with the greatest focus on frequency of posts. With the exception of high-engaged users based on high post frequency, the current review found little evidence for consistent participatory styles across different health communities. However, this area of research is in its infancy, with most of the

Can You Hear Me Now? The Impact of Voice in an Online Gaming Community

Science.gov (United States)

Williams, Dmitri; Caplan, Scott; Xiong, Li

2007-01-01

This paper reports the results of a controlled field experiment in which voice communication was introduced into an existing online community (online gaming guilds within the popular game "World of Warcraft"), comparing a mix of voice and text with text only. Quantitative results suggest increases in liking and trust due to the addition of voice,…

Building Bridges through Scientific Conferences

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zierath, Juleen R

2016-01-01

Getting together to exchange ideas, forge collaborations, and disseminate knowledge is a long-standing tradition of scientific communities. How conferences are serving the community, what their current challenges are, and what is in store for the future of conferences are the topics covered...

Awareness of eSafety and Potential Online Dangers among Children and Teenagers

Science.gov (United States)

Zilka, Gila Cohen

2017-01-01

Aim/Purpose: Awareness of eSafety and potential online dangers for children and teenagers. Background: The study examined eSafety among children and teenagers from their own perspectives, through evaluations of their awareness level of eSafety and of potential online dangers. Methodology: This is a mixed-method study with both quantitative and…

The What and How of Online Communities : An exploratory desk research

NARCIS (Netherlands)

drs. Skylla Janssen; Gina Ocana Machado

2014-01-01

For this exploratory study we aim to provide knowledge and insights concerning the processes of setting up, implementing and managing online communities as a part of the product/services offer of media companies. The goal is to increase their reach amongst target groups, to strengthen involvement

Microbicides 2006 conference

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

McGowan Ian

2006-10-01

Full Text Available Abstract Current HIV/AIDS statistics show that women account for almost 60% of HIV infections in Sub-Saharan Africa. HIV prevention tools such as male and female condoms, abstinence and monogamy are not always feasible options for women due to various socio-economic and cultural factors. Microbicides are products designed to be inserted in the vagina or rectum prior to sex to prevent HIV acquisition. The biannual Microbicides conference took place in Cape Town, South Africa from 23–26 April 2006. The conference was held for the first time on the African continent, the region worst affected by the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The conference brought together a record number of 1,300 scientists, researchers, policy makers, healthcare workers, communities and advocates. The conference provided an opportunity for an update on microbicide research and development as well as discussions around key issues such as ethics, acceptability, access and community involvement. This report discusses the current status of microbicide research and development, encompassing basic and clinical science, social and behavioural science, and community mobilisation and advocacy activities.

Predictive Modeling to Forecast Student Outcomes and Drive Effective Interventions in Online Community College Courses

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Vernon C.; Lange, Adam; Huston, Daniel R.

2012-01-01

Community colleges continue to experience growth in online courses. This growth reflects the need to increase the numbers of students who complete certificates or degrees. Retaining online students, not to mention assuring their success, is a challenge that must be addressed through practical institutional responses. By leveraging existing student…

Does Online Marketing Truly Replace Traditional Marketing?

OpenAIRE

Gunawan, Emilia Margareth

2013-01-01

This review explains the way how online marketing has been replacing traditional marketing in terms of marketing mix. This replacement might happen, because online marketing can give advantages, i.e., offering on-time delivery, increasing effectiveness of two way interactions between buyer and seller, and creating online communities (Szmigin, et al, 2005). The transition of atoms to bits format reflects that tangible products in traditional marketing is being digitalized. The marketing strate...

Introducing a Relationship Marketing perspective in the measurement of Online Community success

OpenAIRE

Nadia Jouini; Ilaria Dalla Pozza

2014-01-01

A relationship marketing perspective is missed in measuring the success of online communities. Scope of this paper is to introduce a relationship marketing perspective in the definition of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for measuring the success of onl

E-herding : patterns of online mass-behavior

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Langley, D.J.; Hoeve, M.; Ortt, J.R.; Pals, N.

2012-01-01

Herding is convergent social behavior driven by inter-personal interaction, without centralized coordination. Herding in the online setting, which we call e-herding, is important for marketing scholars and practitioners because of its potential impact on product adoption and brand image and because

The Predictive Relationship among the Community of Inquiry Framework, Perceived Learning and Online, and Graduate Students' Course Grades in Online Synchronous and Asynchronous Courses

Science.gov (United States)

Rockinson-Szapkiw, Amanda J.; Wendt, Jillian; Wighting, Mervyn; Nisbet, Deanna

2016-01-01

The Community of Inquiry framework has been widely supported by research to provide a model of online learning that informs the design and implementation of distance learning courses. However, the relationship between elements of the CoI framework and perceived learning warrants further examination as a predictive model for online graduate student…

The Influences of Online Brand Communities, Social Media and Member Relationship on Purchase Intention for Luxury Goods: Focus on Taiwan Market

OpenAIRE

Chen, PAi-Yuan

2011-01-01

In the latest decade, Brand Community has been widely discussed and considered as one of the best ways that the business and customers co-create value to enhance the brand loyalty and purchase intention. In recent years, with the development of Internet, the concept of social media and online brand community is thriving. However, while it is a trend for the business to build an online community through social media, luxury brand companies hesitate to embrace social media and online brand c...

Educating the Citizen of Academia Online?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mariann Solberg

2011-05-01

Full Text Available The Arctic is a vast, sparsely populated area. The demographic situation points to online distance education as a solution to support lifelong learning and to build competence in the region. An overall aim of all university education is what Hans Georg Gadamer calls Bildung, what we in Norwegian call dannelse and what Richard Rorty has called edification. A first problem to be addressed here is that in online distance learning some teachers find that is harder to support the development of the student’s voice. Being able to express oneself and to position oneself in a scientific community is vital for a well-educated graduate. Another problem in online education has been the extensive use of writing as a means in the student’s learning process. Writing is vital to academic education, but in online courses there is in general a danger of overuse. At the University of Tromsø we have tested the web conference tool Elluminate Live. This is a real-time application, integrated in the University’s learning management system (LMS, Fronter. The application enables synchronous oral dialogue, simultaneous sharing of texts, and so forth. I present our main experience with the use of Elluminate Live and discuss the extent to which this application has turned out to be helpful in developing the quality of online courses.

Proceedings of CanWEA's 21. annual conference and trade show 2005. On-line Ed.

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2005-01-01

Wind energy presents significant potential in the Canadian energy mix. The Canadian Wind Energy Association has established a national wind target of 10,000 MW of wind power capacity by 2010. The focus of this conference was on federal wind policy, as well as issues concerning research and development and interconnection with electrical grids. Small wind policy developments with details of bylaws and funding scenarios were also examined, as well as various provincial policies and initiatives. Other topics of discussion included energy capture; technical challenges in remote communities; wind and First Nations communities; dynamic analyses of various wind-hydro systems; wind energy as a social development tool; wind energy and the development of a greenhouse gas offset systems; environmental assessment guidance with reference to birds; and wind energy and industrial development. In addition, new wind power technologies were examined. Various provincial policy updates were presented. Issues concerning wind forecasting and the modelling of climatological reference data were discussed. Marketing strategies for wind power producers were presented. Canadian grid interconnection standards were reviewed and issues concerning education and training were examined in relation to the industry's projected growth. Various international policies and strategies were reviewed. Insurance and risk assessment strategies in the wind power industry were examined. Ninety-four presentations were given at this conference, of which 23 have been catalogued separately for inclusion in this database

Online, directed journaling in community health advanced practice nursing clinical education.

Science.gov (United States)

Daroszewski, Ellen Beth; Kinser, Anita G; Lloyd, Susan L

2004-04-01

The sharing of experiences in advanced practice nursing clinical courses allows for application of core principals to different facets of practice, with the potential to promote discussions beyond the course objectives, create opportunities for mentoring, foster critical thinking, and facilitate change and socialization into advanced practice. A pilot test of online, directed journaling, an innovative sharing and reflection strategy, was incorporated in a two-quarter community health advanced practice nursing clinical course in an attempt to enhance clinical learning. Six female graduate nursing students completed the journaling. A 10-item evaluation measure demonstrated that the online journaling strategy was highly effective and valuable for the students. An assessment of the journaling entries found multiple examples of discussion, mentoring, critical thinking, and socialization. Innovative online strategies should become the standard for sharing in advanced practice nursing education.

Player communities in multiplayer online games : A systematic review of emperical research

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Warmelink, H.J.G.; Siitonen, M.

2011-01-01

Numerous researchers have written about the social dynamics of player communities in multiplayer online games. Following a systematic review of refereed empirical research publications from 2000-2010, this article synthesizes the key methods and concepts researchers have used to study and

77 FR 9948 - International Conference on Harmonisation; Guidance on E7 Studies in Support of Special...

Science.gov (United States)

2012-02-21

...] International Conference on Harmonisation; Guidance on E7 Studies in Support of Special Populations; Geriatrics... Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is announcing the availability of a guidance entitled ``E7 Studies... under the auspices of the International Conference on Harmonisation of Technical Requirements for...

Students' Perceptions of Online Discussions, Participation and E-Moderation Behaviours in Peer-Moderated Asynchronous Online Discussions

Science.gov (United States)

Ghadirian, Hajar; Fauzi Mohd Ayub, Ahmad; Salehi, Keyvan

2018-01-01

The aim of this study was to investigate the relationships between students' perceptions of online discussions, participation and e-moderation behaviours in peer-moderated asynchronous online discussions. Using survey data, the learning system's activity log and discussion transcripts, the authors analysed how 84 learners' perceptions of online…

The relationship between Eservice quality, Evalue, Esatisfacton and eLoyalty in online tourism portals

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

K Wood

2013-07-01

establish eLoyalty. The target population of this study was South African tourism accommodation establishments who advertised on online tourism portals during 2005. A personalised branded HTML email with a clickable link to the online survey was mailed to all respondents. One hundred and nine valid responses were received. A multi-item questionnaire was used to measure the relationship between eService quality, eValue, eSatisfaction and eLoyalty pertaining to online tourism portals utilised by the respondents. The findings imply that online tourism portals would increase their eLoyalty (and thus increase profits if they first satisfied their suppliers’ needs by providing them with a secure, visually pleasing user interface with which they could identify. Secondly, there is a need for online tourism portals to provide services that add value, making it easy for suppliers to add and change details on their own pages, as well as ensuring that their suppliers receive a substantial income stream through the portal.

Liking and hyperlinking: Community detection in online child sexual exploitation networks.

Science.gov (United States)

Westlake, Bryce G; Bouchard, Martin

2016-09-01

The online sexual exploitation of children is facilitated by websites that form virtual communities, via hyperlinks, to distribute images, videos, and other material. However, how these communities form, are structured, and evolve over time is unknown. Collected using a custom-designed webcrawler, we begin from known child sexual exploitation (CE) seed websites and follow hyperlinks to connected, related, websites. Using a repeated measure design we analyze 10 networks of 300 + websites each - over 4.8 million unique webpages in total, over a period of 60 weeks. Community detection techniques reveal that CE-related networks were dominated by two large communities hosting varied material -not necessarily matching the seed website. Community stability, over 60 weeks, varied across networks. Reciprocity in hyperlinking between community members was substantially higher than within the full network, however, websites were not more likely to connect to homogeneous-content websites. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Developing Online Marketing in Social Media for DORTMUNDtourismus e.V.

OpenAIRE

Steinrücken, Thomas

2010-01-01

The thesis discussed the topic of online marketing in social media. The focus was set on the social media platforms Facebook, YouTube and Flickr. Commissioner of the thesis was DORTMUNDtourismus e.V., the destination management organization for Dortmund, Germany. The research problem was to identify ways to develop online marketing in social media in a cost-efficient and innovative way in order to raise the awareness of DORTMUNDtourismus e.V. and Dortmund in social media and as a destination....

Method-centered digital communities on protocols.io for fast-paced scientific innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Kindler, Lori; Stoliartchouk, Alexei; Teytelman, Leonid; Hurwitz, Bonnie L

2016-01-01

The Internet has enabled online social interaction for scientists beyond physical meetings and conferences. Yet despite these innovations in communication, dissemination of methods is often relegated to just academic publishing. Further, these methods remain static, with subsequent advances published elsewhere and unlinked. For communities undergoing fast-paced innovation, researchers need new capabilities to share, obtain feedback, and publish methods at the forefront of scientific development. For example, a renaissance in virology is now underway given the new metagenomic methods to sequence viral DNA directly from an environment. Metagenomics makes it possible to "see" natural viral communities that could not be previously studied through culturing methods. Yet, the knowledge of specialized techniques for the production and analysis of viral metagenomes remains in a subset of labs.  This problem is common to any community using and developing emerging technologies and techniques. We developed new capabilities to create virtual communities in protocols.io, an open access platform, for disseminating protocols and knowledge at the forefront of scientific development. To demonstrate these capabilities, we present a virology community forum called VERVENet. These new features allow virology researchers to share protocols and their annotations and optimizations, connect with the broader virtual community to share knowledge, job postings, conference announcements through a common online forum, and discover the current literature through personalized recommendations to promote discussion of cutting edge research. Virtual communities in protocols.io enhance a researcher's ability to: discuss and share protocols, connect with fellow community members, and learn about new and innovative research in the field.  The web-based software for developing virtual communities is free to use on protocols.io. Data are available through public APIs at protocols.io.

Klik-suri sa Online Community ng mga Lesbiyana sa Facebook Gamit ang Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA at Natural Language Processing (NLP (Click-analysis of a Lesbian Online Community in Facebook Using the CDA and NLP

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alona Jumaquio-Ardales

2017-12-01

Full Text Available This study aims to describe the discourse on the online community of lesbians in the Philippines. The organization of Lesbian Community or LESCOM was chosen as subject of the study based on high number of ‘likes’ they received in Facebook. The texts were automatically gathered, filtered, shortlisted, and harvested from their Facebook page using the Natural Language Processing (NLP. The theoretical framework of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA was used in analysing the data in order to describe online discourses that reflect the identity and community of lesbians based in the Philippines. The result of analysis were the following: [1] the emotions projected by exclamatory mark displayed their identity; [2] some plural words served as their voice for being group-oriented; [3] frequent usage of personal names manifested their inclusive community; and [4] social consciousness was part of their organizational agenda.

The 2015 Bioinformatics Open Source Conference (BOSC 2015).

Science.gov (United States)

Harris, Nomi L; Cock, Peter J A; Lapp, Hilmar; Chapman, Brad; Davey, Rob; Fields, Christopher; Hokamp, Karsten; Munoz-Torres, Monica

2016-02-01

The Bioinformatics Open Source Conference (BOSC) is organized by the Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF), a nonprofit group dedicated to promoting the practice and philosophy of open source software development and open science within the biological research community. Since its inception in 2000, BOSC has provided bioinformatics developers with a forum for communicating the results of their latest efforts to the wider research community. BOSC offers a focused environment for developers and users to interact and share ideas about standards; software development practices; practical techniques for solving bioinformatics problems; and approaches that promote open science and sharing of data, results, and software. BOSC is run as a two-day special interest group (SIG) before the annual Intelligent Systems in Molecular Biology (ISMB) conference. BOSC 2015 took place in Dublin, Ireland, and was attended by over 125 people, about half of whom were first-time attendees. Session topics included "Data Science;" "Standards and Interoperability;" "Open Science and Reproducibility;" "Translational Bioinformatics;" "Visualization;" and "Bioinformatics Open Source Project Updates". In addition to two keynote talks and dozens of shorter talks chosen from submitted abstracts, BOSC 2015 included a panel, titled "Open Source, Open Door: Increasing Diversity in the Bioinformatics Open Source Community," that provided an opportunity for open discussion about ways to increase the diversity of participants in BOSC in particular, and in open source bioinformatics in general. The complete program of BOSC 2015 is available online at http://www.open-bio.org/wiki/BOSC_2015_Schedule.

Two Decades of HELINA Conferences: A Historical Review of Health Informatics in Africa.

Science.gov (United States)

Korpela, M

2013-01-01

Review the history of health informatics in Africa as projected by the HELINA conferences, to draw inferences for the next phase. Summarising from the proceedings of HELINA 93, unpublished programmes and reports of later conferences, abstracts and presentations on the web sites of the most recent conferences, and personal recollections of all but one of the conferences. Analysing the e-health situation in Africa in 1993, 2007 and 2011 by mapping software applications presented in the respective conferences on a simplified model of potential spots for e-health use. The following phases were identified: Pre-phase from 1979; individual scientific papers. Phase 1, the 1993-1999 conferences; carried by the momentum of HELINA 93. Phase 2, interregnum; difficulty to find conference organisers. Phase 3, the 2007-2011 conferences; carried by the HELINA association as IMIA Africa Region. Currently most of the important spots for e-health use are being populated by appropriate software applications, mostly by collaborative open source projects. Phase 4 starting, characterised by the expansion of e-health practice on the continent, the HELINA association as a key organiser, and annual HELINA conferences becoming scientifically stronger and more visible. Key issues in making health informatics blossom in Africa include local development capacity, community orientation, collaborative design, international collaboration, government support, champions and organised continent-wide collaboration.

PREFACE: International Conference on Computing in High Energy and Nuclear Physics (CHEP'09)

Science.gov (United States)

Gruntorad, Jan; Lokajicek, Milos

2010-11-01

The 17th International Conference on Computing in High Energy and Nuclear Physics (CHEP) was held on 21-27 March 2009 in Prague, Czech Republic. CHEP is a major series of international conferences for physicists and computing professionals from the worldwide High Energy and Nuclear Physics community, Computer Science, and Information Technology. The CHEP conference provides an international forum to exchange information on computing experience and needs for the community, and to review recent, ongoing and future activities. Recent conferences were held in Victoria, Canada 2007, Mumbai, India in 2006, Interlaken, Switzerland in 2004, San Diego, USA in 2003, Beijing, China in 2001, Padua, Italy in 2000. The CHEP'09 conference had 600 attendees with a program that included plenary sessions of invited oral presentations, a number of parallel sessions comprising 200 oral and 300 poster presentations, and an industrial exhibition. We thanks all the presenters, for the excellent scientific content of their contributions to the conference. Conference tracks covered topics on Online Computing, Event Processing, Software Components, Tools and Databases, Hardware and Computing Fabrics, Grid Middleware and Networking Technologies, Distributed Processing and Analysis and Collaborative Tools. The conference included excursions to Prague and other Czech cities and castles and a banquet held at the Zofin palace in Prague. The next CHEP conference will be held in Taipei, Taiwan on 18-22 October 2010. We would like thank the Ministry of Education Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic and the EU ACEOLE project for the conference support, further to commercial sponsors, the International Advisory Committee, the Local Organizing Committee members representing the five collaborating Czech institutions Jan Gruntorad (co-chair), CESNET, z.s.p.o., Prague Andrej Kugler, Nuclear Physics Institute AS CR v.v.i., Rez Rupert Leitner, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Mathematics and

The motivations and experiences of students enrolled in online science courses at the community college

Science.gov (United States)

Ghosh, Urbi

An important question in online learning involves how to effectively motivate and retain students in science online courses. There is a dearth of research and knowledge about the experiences of students enrolled in online science courses in community colleges which has impeded the proper development and implementation of online courses and retention of students in the online environment. This study sought to provide an understanding of the relationships among each of the following variables: self-efficacy, task value, negative-achievement emotions, self-regulation learning strategies (metacognition), learning strategy (elaboration), and course satisfaction to student's performance (course final grade). Bandura's social-cognitive theory was used as a framework to describe the relationships among students' motivational beliefs (perceived task value, self-efficacy, and self-regulation) and emotions (frustration and boredom) with the dependent variables (elaboration and overall course satisfaction). A mixed-method design was used with a survey instrumentation and student interviews. A variety of science online courses in biology, genetics, astronomy, nutrition, and chemistry were surveyed in two community colleges. Community colleges students (N = 107) completed a questionnaire during enrollment in a variety of online science online courses. Upon course completion, 12 respondents were randomly selected for follow-up in-depth interviews. Multiple regression results from the study indicate perceived task value and self-regulatory learning strategies (metacognition) were as important predictors for students' use of elaboration, while self-efficacy and the number of prior online courses was not significant predictors for students' elaboration when all four predictors were included. Frustration was a significant negative predictor of overall course satisfaction, and boredom unexpectedly emerged as a positive predictor when frustration was also in the model. In addition, the

Science Education on the Internet: Conference for Developers of OnLine Curricula ''Learning Strategies for Science Education Websites''; FINAL

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gesteland, Raymond F.; Dart, Dorothy S.; Logan, Jennifer; Stark, Louisa

2000-01-01

Internet-based science education programs are coming of age. Educators now look seriously to the Internet as a source of accessible classroom materials, and they are finding many high-quality online science programs. Beyond providing solid curriculum, these programs have many advantages. They provide materials that are far more current than what textbooks offer and are more accessible to disadvantaged and rural population. Students can engage in inquiry-based learning online through interactive and virtual activities, accessing databases, tracking nature occurrences in real time, joining online science communities and conversing with scientists

The Influence of eHealth Literacy on Perceived Trust in Online Health Communication Channels and Sources.

Science.gov (United States)

Paige, Samantha R; Krieger, Janice L; Stellefson, Michael L

2017-01-01

Disparities in online health information accessibility are partially due to varying levels of eHealth literacy and perceived trust. This study examined the relationship between eHealth literacy and perceived trust in online health communication channels and sources among diverse sociodemographic groups. A stratified sample of Black/African Americans (n = 402) and Caucasians (n = 409) completed a Web-based survey that measured eHealth literacy and perceived trustworthiness of online health communication channels and information sources. eHealth literacy positively predicted perceived trust in online health communication channels and sources, but disparities existed by sociodemographic factors. Segmenting audiences according to eHealth literacy level provides a detailed understanding of how perceived trust in discrete online health communication channels and information sources varies among diverse audiences. Black/African Americans with low eHealth literacy had high perceived trust in YouTube and Twitter, whereas Black/African Americans with high eHealth literacy had high perceived trust in online government and religious organizations. Older adults with low eHealth literacy had high perceived trust in Facebook but low perceived trust in online support groups. Researchers and practitioners should consider the sociodemographics and eHealth literacy level of an intended audience when tailoring information through trustworthy online health communication channels and information sources.

Knowledge Discovery from Posts in Online Health Communities Using Unified Medical Language System

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Donghua Chen

2018-06-01

Full Text Available Patient-reported posts in Online Health Communities (OHCs contain various valuable information that can help establish knowledge-based online support for online patients. However, utilizing these reports to improve online patient services in the absence of appropriate medical and healthcare expert knowledge is difficult. Thus, we propose a comprehensive knowledge discovery method that is based on the Unified Medical Language System for the analysis of narrative posts in OHCs. First, we propose a domain-knowledge support framework for OHCs to provide a basis for post analysis. Second, we develop a Knowledge-Involved Topic Modeling (KI-TM method to extract and expand explicit knowledge within the text. We propose four metrics, namely, explicit knowledge rate, latent knowledge rate, knowledge correlation rate, and perplexity, for the evaluation of the KI-TM method. Our experimental results indicate that our proposed method outperforms existing methods in terms of providing knowledge support. Our method enhances knowledge support for online patients and can help develop intelligent OHCs in the future.

The Feasibility of an Online Health Program for Community College Students

Science.gov (United States)

Donovan, Elizabeth; Chiauzzi, Emil; Floyd, Deborah L.; Bond, Kathleen; Wood, Mollie

2012-01-01

A comprehensive, four-phase approach was used to test the feasibility of an online, tailored health program for community college students. The prototype was perceived by students as relevant and useful; practitioners were favorable toward offering the program as part of orientation and in a credit-course format. (Contains 4 tables and 2 figures.)

Bridging Services: Drug Abuse, Human Services and the Therapeutic Community. Proceedings of the World Conference of Therapeutic Communities (9th, San Francisco, California, September 1-6, 1985).

Science.gov (United States)

Acampora, Alfonso P., Ed.; Nebelkopf, Ethan, Ed.

The World Federation of Therapeutic Communities is an international association of drug treatment centers that use the "Therapeutic Community" (TC) to combat chemical dependency and drug addiction. Their 1985 conference focused on bridging services between the TC and the traditional human service systems. A total of 85 separate papers were…

PREFACE: International Conference on Structural Nano Composites (NANOSTRUC 2012)

Science.gov (United States)

Njuguna, James

2012-09-01

Dear Colleagues It is a great pleasure to welcome you to NanoStruc2012 at Cranfield University. The purpose of the 2012 International Conference on Structural Nano Composites (NanoStruc2012) is to promote activities in various areas of materials and structures by providing a forum for exchange of ideas, presentation of technical achievements and discussion of future directions. NanoStruc brings together an international community of experts to discuss the state-of-the-art, new research results, perspectives of future developments, and innovative applications relevant to structural materials, engineering structures, nanocomposites, modelling and simulations, and their related application areas. The conference is split in 7 panel sessions, Metallic Nanocomposites and Coatings, Silica based Nanocomposites, safty of Nanomaterials, Carboin based Nanocomposites, Multscale Modelling, Bio materials and Application of Nanomaterials. All accepted Papers will be published in the IOP Conference Series: Materials Science and Engineering (MSE), and included in the NanoStruc online digital library. The abstracts will be indexed in Scopus, Compedex, Inspec, INIS (International Nuclear Information System), Chemical Abstracts, NASA Astrophysics Data System and Polymer Library. Before ending this message, I would like to acknowledge the hard work, professional skills and efficiency of the team which ensured the general organisation. As a conclusion, I would like to Welcome you to the Nanostruc2012 and wish you a stimulating Conference and a wonderful time. On behalf of the scientific committee, Signature James Njuguna Conference Chair The PDF of this preface also contains committee listings and associates logos.

Styles of moderation in online health and support communities : an experimental comparison of their acceptance and effectiveness

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Matzat, U.; Rooks, G.

2014-01-01

Medical and social support communities depend very much on the active participation of their members. An active nurturing and moderation of online community activities is often necessary to overcome typical problems of community interaction, such as a lack of trust and active engagement. However, it

Adapting to large-scale changes in Advanced Placement Biology, Chemistry, and Physics: the impact of online teacher communities

Science.gov (United States)

Frumin, Kim; Dede, Chris; Fischer, Christian; Foster, Brandon; Lawrenz, Frances; Eisenkraft, Arthur; Fishman, Barry; Jurist Levy, Abigail; McCoy, Ayana

2018-03-01

Over the past decade, the field of teacher professional learning has coalesced around core characteristics of high quality professional development experiences (e.g. Borko, Jacobs, & Koellner, 2010. Contemporary approaches to teacher professional development. In P. L. Peterson, E. Baker, & B. McGaw (Eds.), International encyclopedia of education (Vol. 7, pp. 548-556). Oxford: Elsevier.; Darling-Hammond, Hyler, & Gardner, 2017. Effective teacher professional development. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute). Many countries have found these advances of great interest because of a desire to build teacher capacity in science education and across the full curriculum. This paper continues this progress by examining the role and impact of an online professional development community within the top-down, large-scale curriculum and assessment revision of Advanced Placement (AP) Biology, Chemistry, and Physics. This paper is part of a five-year, longitudinal, U.S. National Science Foundation-funded project to study the relative effectiveness of various types of professional development in enabling teachers to adapt to the revised AP course goals and exams. Of the many forms of professional development our research has examined, preliminary analyses indicated that participation in the College Board's online AP Teacher Community (APTC) - where teachers can discuss teaching strategies, share resources, and connect with each other - had positive, direct, and statistically significant association with teacher self-reported shifts in practice and with gains in student AP scores (Fishman et al., 2014). This study explored how usage of the online APTC might be useful to teachers and examined a more robust estimate of these effects. Findings from the experience of AP teachers may be valuable in supporting other large-scale curriculum changes, such as the U.S. Next Generation Science Standards or Common Core Standards, as well as parallel curricular shifts in other countries.

Web 2.0 Technologies and Building Online Learning Communities: Students' Perspectives

Science.gov (United States)

Abdelmalak, Mariam Mousa Matta

2015-01-01

The purpose of this action research was to explore students' perspectives regarding using Web 2.0 technologies to develop a community of learners. The course described in this study was a fully online course in an Educational Learning Technologies master's program at a medium-sized university in the U.S. Southwest. A variety of Web 2.0 tools…

Identifying gender-preferred communication styles within online cancer communities: a retrospective, longitudinal analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Durant, Kathleen T; McCray, Alexa T; Safran, Charles

2012-01-01

The goal of this research is to determine if different gender-preferred social styles can be observed within the user interactions at an online cancer community. To achieve this goal, we identify and measure variables that pertain to each gender-specific social style. We perform social network and statistical analysis on the communication flow of 8,388 members at six different cancer forums over eight years. Kruskal-Wallis tests were conducted to measure the difference between the number of intimate (and highly intimate) dyads, relationship length, and number of communications. We determine that two patients are more likely to form an intimate bond on a gender-specific cancer forum (ovarian P = communicates with more members than a female patient (Ovarian forum P = 0.0406, Breast forum P = 0.0013). A relationship between two patients is longer on the gender-specific cancer forums than a connection between two members not identified as patients (ovarian forum P = 0.00406, breast forum P = 0.00013, prostate forum P = .0.0003). The high level of interconnectedness among the prostate patients supports the hypothesis that men prefer to socialize in large, interconnected, less-intimate groups. A female patient is more likely to form a highly intimate connection with another female patient; this finding is consistent with the hypothesis that woman prefer fewer, more intimate connections. The relationships of same-gender cancer patients last longer than other relationships; this finding demonstrates homophily within these online communities. Our findings regarding online communication preferences are in agreement with research findings from person-to-person communication preference studies. These findings should be considered when designing online communities as well as designing and evaluating psychosocial and educational interventions for cancer patients.

Analisis Faktor Kredibilitas Website E-Commerce Indonesia Studi pada Online Purchasing

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Muhammad Cordiaz

2016-01-01

Full Text Available In the number of Internet users in Indonesia continues to increase. Internet increasingly being used for purchasing online. There are many e-commerce websites that offer goods and services online. Internet users should be able to distinguish which websites are credible before engaging in electronic commerce activities. Be an interesting question, what factors are rated by visitors of a website as an e-commerce website that is credible or reliable. Using a web-based survey methods, respondents were asked what factors support the credibility of the website in electronic commerce purchasing transactions. The respondents were Internet users. Proposed survey questions are grouped into four factors, namely, kerpercayaan factors, factors expertise, sponsorship factors and specific factors. The survey results were tested with descriptive statistic. Based on the data obtained, the Trust Factor respondents prefer e-commerce website that is trusted by his close associates, while the respondents assess the Skill Factor of websites that apply when payments online transactions through banks Indonesia is considered more reliable. In the Sponsorship Factor and Specific Factor, respondents believe the e-commerce website that does television ads in the media and managed by official institutions. Keywords : credibility, trustworthiness, expertise, electronic commerce, online purchasing

The Community of Inquiry Framework Meets the SOLO Taxonomy: A Process-Product Model of Online Learning

Science.gov (United States)

Shea, Peter; Gozza-Cohen, Mary; Uzuner, Sedef; Mehta, Ruchi; Valtcheva, Anna Valentinova; Hayes, Suzanne; Vickers, Jason

2011-01-01

This paper presents both a conceptual and empirical investigation of teaching and learning in online courses. Employing both the Community of Inquiry framework (CoI) and the Structure of Observed Learning Outcomes (SOLO) taxonomy, two complete online courses were examined for the quality of both collaborative learning processes and learning…

[Attitude of patients and customers toward on-line purchase of drugs--a Hungarian survey by community pharmacies].

Science.gov (United States)

Fittler, András; Bosze, Gergely; Botz, Lajos

2010-11-28

As internet is now available to nearly everyone in Hungary, the accessibility of websites offering pharmaceutical products is also increasing. The national and international regulation of these sites is currently an unsolved problem worldwide, thus potentially harmful, counterfeit and prescription only medicines are easily accessible on the market. We aimed to measure and estimate the current situation of the ordering of online medicines. In 5 Hungarian cities 434 self-administered questionnaires were collected in community pharmacies. Our results show that 6.2% of the respondents have already ordered drugs or dietary supplements online and approximately same amount of people are considering this option in the near future. Based on our survey mostly the educated, the 30-49 year old people and women are likely to buy drugs online. Every fifth respondent reported willingness to buy drugs online from abroad if lower prices were offered. Most people do not know that the quality of medicines purchased online could be different from the ones purchased from community pharmacies. We would like to draw attention of healthcare professionals to the rising popularity and potential risks of drugs available online.

Donor Retention in Online Crowdfunding Communities: A Case Study of DonorsChoose.org.

Science.gov (United States)

Althoff, Tim; Leskovec, Jure

2015-05-01

Online crowdfunding platforms like DonorsChoose.org and Kick-starter allow specific projects to get funded by targeted contributions from a large number of people. Critical for the success of crowdfunding communities is recruitment and continued engagement of donors. With donor attrition rates above 70%, a significant challenge for online crowdfunding platforms as well as traditional offline non-profit organizations is the problem of donor retention. We present a large-scale study of millions of donors and donations on DonorsChoose.org, a crowdfunding platform for education projects. Studying an online crowdfunding platform allows for an unprecedented detailed view of how people direct their donations. We explore various factors impacting donor retention which allows us to identify different groups of donors and quantify their propensity to return for subsequent donations. We find that donors are more likely to return if they had a positive interaction with the receiver of the donation. We also show that this includes appropriate and timely recognition of their support as well as detailed communication of their impact. Finally, we discuss how our findings could inform steps to improve donor retention in crowdfunding communities and non-profit organizations.

Online University-Industry Collaboration

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Søndergaard, Helle Alsted; Bergenholtz, Carsten; Juhl, Hans Jørn

Extant studies have shown how online communities can promote collaborative and innovative activities in general. Studies on university-industry collaborations have so far focused less on online activities. We therefore set out to examine the individual and organizational drivers and barriers...... for academics and industrial professionals to contribute to online community-based platforms. We use a mixed method approach using both survey data and in-depth interviews with respondents from the Danish food sector. Findings show that in line with known studies on online innovation communities in general......, the main drivers for engagement are organizational and individual learning, and establishing connections, rather than monetary incentives. In contrast to offline studies on university-industry interactions, well-connected academics are less interested in online communities of academics and industry...

Developing the Oral Skill in Online English Courses Framed by the Community of Inquiry

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Luz Edith Herrera Díaz

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Over the last decade, the community of inquiry framework has proved successful for online learning experiences in diverse disciplines, although studies in the teaching of English as a foreign language arena are still scarce. In this vein, this article reports a preliminary study about the development of the oral skill in a Basic English online course, uncovering the relationship between the community of inquiry framework (with its three forms of presence: teaching, cognitive, and social and some indicators of the oral skill. Findings, based on learners’ perceptions, confirmed the existence of such framework and suggest that the teaching presence fosters grammar, accuracy, and vocabulary. Discussion of findings, limitations of the study and future possible research actions conclude this report.

ONLINE SCIENCE LEARNING:Best Practices and Technologies

OpenAIRE

TOJDE

2009-01-01

This essential publication is for all research and academic libraries, especially those institutions with online and distance education courses available in their science education programs. This book will also benefit audiences within the science education community of practice and others interested in STEM education, virtual schools, e-learning, m-learning, natural sciences, physical sciences, biological sciences, geosciences, online learning models, virtual laboratories, virtual field trip...

Are embedded online communities of practice more successful than exclusively virtual ones?

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Matzat, U.

2008-01-01

Is a deliberate shaping of the mixture of virtual and 'real-life' interaction in online communities a crucial condition for diminishing typical problems of knowledge sharing? Typical problems that increase the risk of failure are: 1. a lack of trust between members, 2. free rider behavior, and 3. a

A transition process from information systems acceptance to infusion behaviour in online brand communities: A socialization process perspective

OpenAIRE

Lim, Jaehoon

2012-01-01

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University. Social media such as Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, and online communities plays an important role for knowledge production and diffusion as well as discussions among people. Among social media, online brand communities (OBCs) have recently received attention from both academics and practitioners due to the practical benefits of OBCs for consumers and companies. For consumers, knowledge sharing ...

Tra advergame e mappe online: contaminazioni tra Street View e discorso pubblicitario

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gabriele Ferri

2013-03-01

Full Text Available Molti servizi di cartografia online – Google Maps, Bing Maps, Nokia Maps, Yandex Maps e altri ancora – permettono di esplorare alcuni luoghi da un punto di vista quasi in soggettiva, come se l'utente si trovasse effettivamente sul posto.

The electronic Rothamsted Archive (e-RA), an online resource for data from the Rothamsted long-term experiments.

Science.gov (United States)

Perryman, Sarah A M; Castells-Brooke, Nathalie I D; Glendining, Margaret J; Goulding, Keith W T; Hawkesford, Malcolm J; Macdonald, Andy J; Ostler, Richard J; Poulton, Paul R; Rawlings, Christopher J; Scott, Tony; Verrier, Paul J

2018-05-15

The electronic Rothamsted Archive, e-RA (www.era.rothamsted.ac.uk) provides a permanent managed database to both securely store and disseminate data from Rothamsted Research's long-term field experiments (since 1843) and meteorological stations (since 1853). Both historical and contemporary data are made available via this online database which provides the scientific community with access to a unique continuous record of agricultural experiments and weather measured since the mid-19 th century. Qualitative information, such as treatment and management practices, plans and soil information, accompanies the data and are made available on the e-RA website. e-RA was released externally to the wider scientific community in 2013 and this paper describes its development, content, curation and the access process for data users. Case studies illustrate the diverse applications of the data, including its original intended purposes and recent unforeseen applications. Usage monitoring demonstrates the data are of increasing interest. Future developments, including adopting FAIR data principles, are proposed as the resource is increasingly recognised as a unique archive of data relevant to sustainable agriculture, agroecology and the environment.

Examining the role of technology in learning: an evaluation of online clinical conferencing.

Science.gov (United States)

Cooper, Cathy; Taft, Lois B; Thelen, Mary

2004-01-01

The rapidly expanding use of instructional technology requires faculty openness to new teaching and learning situations. This study compared two instructional methods of conducting clinical conferences for baccalaureate nursing students: online versus face-to-face. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected from 77 students in 10 clinical sections of a senior capstone nursing course. Mean scores for all 11 items on the clinical evaluation tool were higher for students who had conferences online than those in face-to-face conferences. Four of the 11 items were statistically significant, reflecting greater participation and convenience for online participants. Online students also reported greater opportunities to reflect on ethical issues. There were no significant differences in quiz scores between the groups when students were tested on content covered in their clinical conferences. Students identified advantages including opportunities for flexibility and equal participation. Barriers included unfamiliarity with technology and lack of face-to-face-contact. The findings suggest that students can successfully achieve the intended purpose of clinical conferences through an online instructional technique. Ongoing research in the use of technology is necessary to meet student needs, enhance student learning, and support evidence-based practice in nursing education.

In Pursuit of Ethical Research: Studying Hybrid Communities Using Online and Face-to-Face Communications

Science.gov (United States)

Busher, Hugh; James, Nalita

2015-01-01

Hybrid communities using online and face-to-face communications to construct their practices are increasingly part of everyday life amongst people who have easy access to the internet. Researching these communities raises a number of challenges for researchers in the pursuit of ethical research. The paper begins by exploring what is understood by…

Body perceptions and health behaviors in an online bodybuilding community.

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Aaron C T; Stewart, Bob

2012-07-01

In this article we explore the social constructions, body perceptions, and health experiences of a serious recreational and competitive bodybuilder and powerlifter community. Data were obtained from a discussion forum appearing within an online community dedicated to muscular development. Forum postings for a period of 36 months were transposed to QSR NVivo, in which a narrative-based analytical method employing Gee's coding approach was employed. We used a priori codes based on Bourdieu's multipronged conceptual categories of social field, habitus, and capital accumulation as a theoretical frame. Our results expose an extreme social reality held by a devoted muscle-building community with a fanatical obsession with muscular hypertrophy and any accouterment helpful in its acquisition, from nutrition and supplements to training regimes and anabolic androgenic substances. Few health costs were considered too severe in this muscular meritocracy, where the strong commanded deference and the massive dominated the social field.

Multilabel user classification using the community structure of online networks.

Science.gov (United States)

Rizos, Georgios; Papadopoulos, Symeon; Kompatsiaris, Yiannis

2017-01-01

We study the problem of semi-supervised, multi-label user classification of networked data in the online social platform setting. We propose a framework that combines unsupervised community extraction and supervised, community-based feature weighting before training a classifier. We introduce Approximate Regularized Commute-Time Embedding (ARCTE), an algorithm that projects the users of a social graph onto a latent space, but instead of packing the global structure into a matrix of predefined rank, as many spectral and neural representation learning methods do, it extracts local communities for all users in the graph in order to learn a sparse embedding. To this end, we employ an improvement of personalized PageRank algorithms for searching locally in each user's graph structure. Then, we perform supervised community feature weighting in order to boost the importance of highly predictive communities. We assess our method performance on the problem of user classification by performing an extensive comparative study among various recent methods based on graph embeddings. The comparison shows that ARCTE significantly outperforms the competition in almost all cases, achieving up to 35% relative improvement compared to the second best competing method in terms of F1-score.

Multilabel user classification using the community structure of online networks.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Georgios Rizos

Full Text Available We study the problem of semi-supervised, multi-label user classification of networked data in the online social platform setting. We propose a framework that combines unsupervised community extraction and supervised, community-based feature weighting before training a classifier. We introduce Approximate Regularized Commute-Time Embedding (ARCTE, an algorithm that projects the users of a social graph onto a latent space, but instead of packing the global structure into a matrix of predefined rank, as many spectral and neural representation learning methods do, it extracts local communities for all users in the graph in order to learn a sparse embedding. To this end, we employ an improvement of personalized PageRank algorithms for searching locally in each user's graph structure. Then, we perform supervised community feature weighting in order to boost the importance of highly predictive communities. We assess our method performance on the problem of user classification by performing an extensive comparative study among various recent methods based on graph embeddings. The comparison shows that ARCTE significantly outperforms the competition in almost all cases, achieving up to 35% relative improvement compared to the second best competing method in terms of F1-score.

Social Media and eBusiness: Cultural Impacts on the Influence Process in Consumer Communities

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Yong; Chen, Hong; Xu, Li

2016-08-01

Social media has been used as an important tool by firms to influence consumers’ attitude and behavior. Influence occurs in consumer communities in social media because community members have the control of discovering, producing, sharing, and distributing information and because the spread out of their experiences and opinions in the format of electronic word-of-mouth forms emerging conformance. Prior research has explored how the influence occurring in online social media communities impacts consumers’ attitude and behavior (e.g., product attitude and purchase decision, effectual thinking and behavior, brand trust and brand loyalty). But because social media has the ability of global reach, cross-border factors should not be neglected in studying the influence process. As such, this paper adopts national cultural dimensions identified by Hofstede (1984), individualism/collectivism and power distance particularly, the index of cultural distance, and the social influence theory to explore how culture impacts the influence occurring in consumer communities in social media.

Factors that Predict Full-Time Community College Faculty Engagement in Online Instruction

Science.gov (United States)

Akroyd, Duane; Patton, Bess; Bracken, Susan

2013-01-01

This study is a secondary quantitative analysis of the 2004 National Study of Postsecondary Faculty (NSOPF) data. It examines the ability of human capital, intrinsic rewards, extrinsic rewards, and gender/race demographics to predict full-time community college faculty teaching on-line courses. Findings indicate that those faculty with higher…

The Pros and Cons of Getting Engaged in an Online Social Community Embedded Within Digital Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia: Survey Among Users.

Science.gov (United States)

Coulson, Neil S; Smedley, Richard; Bostock, Sophie; Kyle, Simon D; Gollancz, Rosie; Luik, Annemarie I; Hames, Peter; Espie, Colin A

2016-04-25

Sleepio is a proven digital sleep improvement program based on cognitive behavioral therapy techniques. Users have the option to join an online community that includes weekly expert discussions, peer-to-peer discussion forums, and personal message walls. The aim of this study was to conduct an online survey to (1) explore the reasons for deciding to engage with the Sleepio online community, (2) explore the potential benefits arising from engagement with the online community, and (3) identify and describe any problematic issues related to use of the online community. We developed an online survey and posted an invitation to the community discussion forum inviting users to participate. In addition, we sent an email invitation to 970 individuals who had previously or were currently working through the Sleepio program to participate in this study. In total, 100 respondents (70/100, 70% female; mean age 51 years, range 26-82 years) completed the online survey. Most respondents had started Sleepio with chronic sleep problems (59/100, 59% up to 10 years; 35/100, 35% >10 years) and had actively engaged with the online community (85/100, 85%) had made a discussion or wall post). At the time of the survey, respondents had used Sleepio for a median of 12 weeks (range from 3 weeks to 2 years). We analyzed responses to the open-ended questions using thematic analysis. This analysis revealed 5 initial drivers for engagement: (1) the desire to connect with people facing similar issues, (2) seeking personalized advice, (3) curiosity, (4) being invited by other members, and (5) wanting to use all available sleep improvement tools. Advantages of engagement included access to continuous support, a reduced sense of isolation, being part of a nonjudgmental community, personalized advice, positive comparisons with others, encouragement to keep going, and altruism. We found 5 potential disadvantages: design and navigation issues, uncertain quality of user-generated content, negative

168/E online for UA1

CERN Multimedia

1983-01-01

Five 168/E processors and associated specialized interface hardware made an importartant contribution to the UA1 experiment. The processors provided an online event display facility, and also flagged candidate events. See Annual Report 1983 p. 75, and photo 8305815X, 8395813X. This photo shows the team including DD personnel and UA1 members. On the foreground left, is Michel Demoulin. On the background, 3rd from left, is Adolfo Fucci, last Sergio Cittolin.

ONLINE SCIENCE LEARNING:Best Practices and Technologies

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

TOJDE

2009-04-01

Full Text Available This essential publication is for all research and academic libraries, especially those institutions with online and distance education courses available in their science education programs. This book will also benefit audiences within the science education community of practice and others interested in STEM education, virtual schools, e-learning, m-learning, natural sciences, physical sciences, biological sciences, geosciences, online learning models, virtual laboratories, virtual field trips, cyberinfrastructure, neurological learning and the neuro-cognitive model. The continued growth in general studies and liberal arts and science programs online has led to a rise in the number of students whose science learning experiences are partially or exclusively online. character and quality of online science instruction.

ONLINE MARKETING OF HOSPITALITY SERVICES : Tourist satisfaction with online accommodation booking

OpenAIRE

Kaakinen, Heidi; Purkayastha, Eshita

2016-01-01

The aim of this thesis was to study tourist satisfaction in online accommodation booking. Nowadays it is very common to conduct any kind of business online because of its practicality, accessibility and convenience. These days online is a community and it is a very effective way to build relation with the consumers. Hospitality firms like hostel and restaurants are using online community as a marketing tool to reach their customers. Studies have found four participation benefits as to partici...

Expanding beyond Our Library Walls: Building an Active Online Community through Facebook

Science.gov (United States)

Ganster, Ligaya; Schumacher, Bridget

2009-01-01

This article demonstrates how Facebook, a popular social networking Web site, provides libraries with the opportunity to develop an outreach presence and information portal within an online community. While much of the recent literature examines Facebook and defines its potential use within libraries, this article focuses on the use of Facebook's…

Social media e pratiche emergenti di partecipazione: il caso Porto Torres: quando la comunità locale va on-line

OpenAIRE

Bonesu, Rodolfo

2011-01-01

This study looks at a territory-based virtual community grown up on the most recent platform for online community building: the social network site (SNS). With the Sardinian industrial town of Porto Torres being the local community, and Facebook the virtual platform of interaction, this study specifically approaches the question of how and to what extent territory-based online interaction can impact local political participation and social capital. Porto Torres is a small town in the Italian ...

Online Professional Development Conferences: An Effective, Economical and Eco-Friendly Option

Science.gov (United States)

Anderson, Lynn; Anderson, Terry

2009-01-01

In order to stay current within their field, many professionals regularly attend conferences and training events in distant locales. Travel to these conferences costs professionals, and their sponsor organizations, both time and money. In the past the benefits afforded by these conferences, and the lack of comparable alternatives, have provided…

Participative Action Research: The Vision Conference

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

René Victor Valqui Vidal

2003-11-01

Full Text Available This paper presents the principles behind the design and management of the Vision Conference: a one-day workshop for a large group of participants endeavoured to create ideas, projects and visions for the future activities of a local community or an organisation. A case study from a local community in Denmark is also presented with the purpose of illustrating the organisation, planning and management of a Vision Conference. The paper focuses in the three central social processes of the conference: group work, problem solving and facilitation. The paper ends with a discussion of creativity and creativity techniques suitable for Vision Conferences.

Topic models for conference session assignment: organising PRASA 2014(5)

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Burke, Michael G

2015-11-01

Full Text Available Conference scheduling and organising is a particularly laborious task and can be exteremely time consuming. While many online conference platforms allow manual topic selection, these can be expensive and typically still require that individual...

Online Behavior Analysis-Based Student Profile for Intelligent E-Learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kun Liang

2017-01-01

Full Text Available With the development of mobile platform, such as smart cellphone and pad, the E-Learning model has been rapidly developed. However, due to the low completion rate for E-Learning platform, it is very necessary to analyze the behavior characteristics of online learners to intelligently adjust online education strategy and enhance the quality of learning. In this paper, we analyzed the relation indicators of E-Learning to build the student profile and gave countermeasures. Adopting the similarity computation and Jaccard coefficient algorithm, we designed a system model to clean and dig into the educational data and also the students’ learning attitude and the duration of learning behavior to establish student profile. According to the E-Learning resources and learner behaviors, we also present the intelligent guide model to guide both E-Learning platform and learners to improve learning things. The study on student profile can help the E-Learning platform to meet and guide the students’ learning behavior deeply and also to provide personalized learning situation and promote the optimization of the E-Learning.

Relationship Between Parental and Adolescent eHealth Literacy and Online Health Information Seeking in Taiwan.

Science.gov (United States)

Chang, Fong-Ching; Chiu, Chiung-Hui; Chen, Ping-Hung; Miao, Nae-Fang; Lee, Ching-Mei; Chiang, Jeng-Tung; Pan, Ying-Chun

2015-10-01

This study examined the relationship between parental and adolescent eHealth literacy and its impact on online health information seeking. Data were obtained from 1,869 junior high school students and 1,365 parents in Taiwan in 2013. Multivariate analysis results showed that higher levels of parental Internet skill and eHealth literacy were associated with an increase in parental online health information seeking. Parental eHealth literacy, parental active use Internet mediation, adolescent Internet literacy, and health information literacy were all related to adolescent eHealth literacy. Similarly, adolescent Internet/health information literacy, eHealth literacy, and parental active use Internet mediation, and parental online health information seeking were associated with an increase in adolescent online health information seeking. The incorporation of eHealth literacy courses into parenting programs and school education curricula is crucial to promote the eHealth literacy of parents and adolescents.

Online Social Support for Patients with Multiple Sclerosis: A Thematic Analysis of Messages Posted to a Virtual Support Community

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Masoumeh Abbasi Shavazi

2016-07-01

Full Text Available Background: Currently with the emergence of the Internet, patients have an opportunity to exchange social support online. However, little attention has been devoted to different dimensions of online social support exchanged in virtual support communities for patients with multiple sclerosis (MS. Methods: To provide a rich insight, the aim of this qualitative study was to explore and categorize different dimensions of online social support in messages exchanged in a virtual support community for patients with MS. A total of 548 posted messages created during one year period were selected using purposive sampling to consider the maximum variation sampling. Prior-research-driven thematic analysis was then conducted. In this regard, we used the Cutruna and Suhr’s coding system. The messages that could not be categorized with the used coding system were thematically analyzed to explore new additional social support themes. Results: The results showed that various forms of social support including informational, emotional, network, esteem and tangible support were exchanged. Moreover, new additional social support themes including sharing personal experiences, sharing coping strategies and spiritual support emerged in this virtual support community. Conclusion: The wide range of online social support exchanged in the virtual support community can be regarded as a supplementary source of social support for patients with MS. Future researches can examine online social support more comprehensively considering additional social support themes emerging in the present study.

Essays on Korean online game communities: A sense of place: Media and motivation in Korea by the Wang-tta effect; Order and chaos in an ethnography of Korean online game communities

OpenAIRE

Chee, Florence

2005-01-01

Essay 1 : This paper presents an ethnographic analysis of the different ways Korean game players establish community. I look at Korean PC game rooms as "third places,", and peer relations associated with online video gaming activities. A synthesis of the Korean concept "Wang-tta" and application of the TEDA Ethos protocol provides extra insight into the motivations to excel at digital games and one of the strong drivers of such community membership. Essay 2: This paper explores the dichotomy ...

An online community of practice to support evidence-based physiotherapy practice in manual therapy.

Science.gov (United States)

Evans, Cathy; Yeung, Euson; Markoulakis, Roula; Guilcher, Sara

2014-01-01

The purpose of this study was to explore how a community of practice promoted the creation and sharing of new knowledge in evidence-based manual therapy using Wenger's constructs of mutual engagement, joint enterprise, and shared repertoire as a theoretical framework. We used a qualitative approach to analyze the discussion board contributions of the 19 physiotherapists who participated in the 10-week online continuing education course in evidence-based practice (EBP) in manual therapy. The course was founded on community of practice, constructivism, social, and situated learning principles. The 1436 postings on 9 active discussion boards revealed that the community of practice was a social learning environment that supported strong participation and mutual engagement. Design features such as consistent facilitation, weekly guiding questions, and collaborative assignments promoted the creation and sharing of knowledge. Participants applied research evidence to the contexts in which they worked through reflective comparison of what they were reading to its applicability in their everyday practice. Participants' shared goals contributed to the common ground established in developing collective knowledge about different study designs, how to answer research questions, and the difficulties of conducting sound research. An online longitudinal community of practice utilized as a continuing education approach to deliver an online course based on constructivist and social learning principles allowed geographically dispersed physiotherapists to be mutually engaged in a joint enterprise in evidence-based manual therapy. Advantages included opportunity for reflection, modeling, and collaboration. Future studies should examine the impact of participation on clinical practice. © 2014 The Alliance for Continuing Education in the Health Professions, the Society for Academic Continuing Medical Education, and the Council on Continuing Medical Education, Association for Hospital

Perceptions of veterinary admissions committee members of undergraduate credits earned from community colleges or online compared to traditional 4-year institutions.

Science.gov (United States)

Kogan, L R; Stewart, S M; Schoenfeld-Tacher, R; Hellyer, P W

2015-01-01

Veterinary admission committees are asked to create and implement a fair, reliable, and valid system to select the candidates most likely to succeed in veterinary school from a large pool of applicants. Although numerous studies have explored grade point average (GPA) as a predictive value of later academic success, there has been little attention paid to how and where an applicant acquires his/her undergraduate coursework. Quality of academic program is an important component of applicant files, and it is suggested that the source of a candidate's coursework might influence admissions committee decisions, perhaps even outside of the committee's immediate awareness. Options for undergraduate education include taking classes at a traditional four-year institution, a community college, or online. This study provides an overview of the current state of online courses and community colleges in the US as a foundation to explore the views of veterinary admissions committee members pertaining to coursework completed at traditional residential 4-year schools or at community colleges and whether they are delivered on campus or online (at either type of institution). Survey participants reported a pattern of preference for traditional four-year residential coursework compared to online or community college courses. These results are interesting given the exponential growth of students taking online courses and data showing community colleges are providing a successful gateway to obtaining a four-year degree. This also points to the need for admission committees to discuss potential biases since the information about type of school and/or course may not be consistently available for all applicants. Finally, at a time when admitting a diverse class of students is a goal of many programs, it is of special concern that there are potential biases against courses taken online or from community colleges - venues that tend to draw a more diverse population than traditional 4-year

Perceptions of veterinary admissions committee members of undergraduate credits earned from community colleges or online compared to traditional 4-year institutions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

L.R. Kogan

2015-06-01

Full Text Available Veterinary admission committees are asked to create and implement a fair, reliable, and valid system to select the candidates most likely to succeed in veterinary school from a large pool of applicants. Although numerous studies have explored grade point average (GPA as a predictive value of later academic success, there has been little attention paid to how and where an applicant acquires his/her undergraduate coursework. Quality of academic program is an important component of applicant files, and it is suggested that the source of a candidate’s coursework might influence admissions committee decisions, perhaps even outside of the committee’s immediate awareness. Options for undergraduate education include taking classes at a traditional four-year institution, a community college, or online. This study provides an overview of the current state of online courses and community colleges in the US as a foundation to explore the views of veterinary admissions committee members pertaining to coursework completed at traditional residential 4-year schools or at community colleges and whether they are delivered on campus or online (at either type of institution. Survey participants reported a pattern of preference for traditional four-year residential coursework compared to online or community college courses. These results are interesting given the exponential growth of students taking online courses and data showing community colleges are providing a successful gateway to obtaining a four-year degree. This also points to the need for admission committees to discuss potential biases since the information about type of school and/or course may not be consistently available for all applicants. Finally, at a time when admitting a diverse class of students is a goal of many programs, it is of special concern that there are potential biases against courses taken online or from community colleges - venues that tend to draw a more diverse population than

Barriers and Facilitators for the Implementation of an Online Clinical Health Community in Addition to Usual Fertility Care: A Cross-Sectional Study

OpenAIRE

Aarts, Johanna WM; Faber, Marjan J; den Boogert, Anne G; Cohlen, Ben J; van der Linden, Paul JQ; Kremer, Jan AM; Nelen, Willianne LDM

2013-01-01

BACKGROUND: Online health communities are becoming more popular in health care. Patients and professionals can communicate with one another online, patients can find peer support, and professionals can use it as an additional information channel to their patients. However, the implementation of online health communities into daily practice is challenging. These challenges relate to the fact that patients need to be activated to (1) become a member (ie, subscription) and (2) participate active...

76 FR 52670 - 2011 Technology Transfer Summit North America Conference

Science.gov (United States)

2011-08-23

... conference will be further enhanced by the TTS Initiative Business Social Network, an online business... leading universities and research institutes together with biotech & pharma licensing & business... relating to partnering, licensing & business development. Conference speakers for the 2011 include: --Kathy...

The Public Library on the Electronic Frontier: Starting a Community Online Information System.

Science.gov (United States)

Fox, Carol J.

1995-01-01

Details the Rockford (Illinois) Public Library's activities involved with developing a community online information system and the not-for-profit organization established to run the system. Includes mission statement; guiding principles, policy statements; standing committees and goals for first year of operation; funding; adding users and…

Identifying gender-preferred communication styles within online cancer communities: a retrospective, longitudinal analysis.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kathleen T Durant

Full Text Available BACKGROUND: The goal of this research is to determine if different gender-preferred social styles can be observed within the user interactions at an online cancer community. To achieve this goal, we identify and measure variables that pertain to each gender-specific social style. METHODS AND FINDINGS: We perform social network and statistical analysis on the communication flow of 8,388 members at six different cancer forums over eight years. Kruskal-Wallis tests were conducted to measure the difference between the number of intimate (and highly intimate dyads, relationship length, and number of communications. We determine that two patients are more likely to form an intimate bond on a gender-specific cancer forum (ovarian P = <0.0001, breast P = 0.0089, prostate P = 0.0021. Two female patients are more likely to form a highly intimate bond on a female-specific cancer forum (Ovarian P<0.0001, Breast P<0.01. Typically a male patient communicates with more members than a female patient (Ovarian forum P = 0.0406, Breast forum P = 0.0013. A relationship between two patients is longer on the gender-specific cancer forums than a connection between two members not identified as patients (ovarian forum P = 0.00406, breast forum P = 0.00013, prostate forum P = .0.0003. CONCLUSION: The high level of interconnectedness among the prostate patients supports the hypothesis that men prefer to socialize in large, interconnected, less-intimate groups. A female patient is more likely to form a highly intimate connection with another female patient; this finding is consistent with the hypothesis that woman prefer fewer, more intimate connections. The relationships of same-gender cancer patients last longer than other relationships; this finding demonstrates homophily within these online communities. Our findings regarding online communication preferences are in agreement with research findings from person-to-person communication

Study on e-government services quality: The integration of online and offline services

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jing Fan

2015-05-01

Full Text Available Purpose: E-Government, as a new bond linking the government and the public, has gradually become the focus of innovation in government services. The paper focuses on the e-Government service quality issues from the perspective of users. Design/methodology/approach: From the aspects of online service quality perception and offline service quality perception, based on IS Success model and SERQUAL model, e-Government Services Quality model has been set up with information quality, system quality and service quality as key factors. Then, the survey method was applied to collect data and then to test the model. Findings: It was found that users’ perception of offline service quality has a significant effect on improving their perception of online service quality, and online service quality perception has a significant effect on public satisfaction of e-Government services; information clarity, system security and stability, interactive services and “one-stop” services all have a significant effect on public satisfaction of e-Government services. However, offline service quality perception has certain positive effect on public satisfaction of e-Government services but not dramatically. Research limitations/implications: Mobile e-Government as an important direction of the development of e-Government, in the future, we will study more about mobile e-Government services channels. Originality/value: This study further develops the theory of information system service quality, and also provides a theoretical reference for government departments. On the one hand, based on the characteristics of e-government system, information quality, system quality and service quality in the previous system service model are further discussed; on the other hand, both online and offline services are taken into consideration in the information system service model, thus establishing the e-government services quality model and making an in-depth study of the

Ensino superior, tutoria online e profissão docente / Higher education, online tutoring and the teaching profession

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Marcia Rozenfeld Gomes de Oliveira

2009-01-01

Full Text Available Este artigo traz a análise de uma pesquisa—de natureza descritivo-analítica—sobre a tutoria online, algumas de suas características e peculiaridades com relação à docência presencial. Para este fim, parte de um questionário respondido por 222 tutoresvirtuais pertencentes aos cursos oferecidos pela Universidade Federal de São Carlos(UFSCar em parceria com a Universidade Aberta do Brasil (UAB e municípios brasileiros. A análise enfocou algumas características dos tutores (e.g., gênero, formação e experiência docente, sua organização do trabalho e atividades exercidas, adivisão de trabalho (entre tutores e professores responsáveis pelas disciplinas, o entendimento dos respondentes sobre a natureza da tutoria e suas percepções sobre a educação a distância (EaD. O estudo fundamentou-se em autores tais como Lortie, Tardif e Shulman sobre a docência na modalidade presencial e em Mill, Maggio eKenski, entre outros, sobre a docência a distância. Os resultados apontam para a predominância de tutores do sexo feminino, assemelhando-se à composição do corpo docente na modalidade presencial nos níveis inferiores, e indicam altos níveis deescolaridade e uma experiência bastante significativa na docência presencial. A despeito das dificuldades encontradas, devidas particularmente à falta de experiência nesta modalidade educacional e a questões técnicas, a maioria dos tutores declarou facilidade na atuação e satisfação com o trabalho realizado. Os dados também sugerem que os tutores gozaram de relativa autonomia com relação tanto às ações associadas à transmissão do conteúdo quanto àquelas relativas à gestão da sala de aula no ambiente virtual de aprendizagem. Esta autonomia pode estar na base da percepção dosrespondentes de que o tutor online, no contexto estudado, exerceria uma função verdadeiramente docente.Abstract This article brings the analysis of a study—of a descriptive-analytical nature�

Marketing Online Services: Product, Market and Strategy.

Science.gov (United States)

Trudell, Libby

1991-01-01

Describes characteristics of the online marketplace. Topics discussed include technology barriers; data ownership; markets for online services, including libraries and end users; marketing and promotion tactics, including exhibits and conferences, advertising, direct mail, and user groups; international marketing and service; strategic marketing…

E-book about E-learning Online Education and Learning Management Systems-Global E-learning in a Scandinavian Perspective

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ugur DEMIRAY

2004-01-01

Full Text Available Prior to year 2000 Scandinavian universities offered selected online courses attracting a few pioneering students. Today, even primary schools offer online services to students, teachers and parents. Online education is becoming mainstream education in Scandinavia.A new, comprehensive and innovative book about e-learning is now available in print and online in several electronic formats. The book’s web-site presents tidbits of the content in several electronic formats such as text, audio, speech synthesis and video.Dr. Erwin Wagner, former President of the European Distance Education Network, characterizes the book as interesting, important, innovative, international and impressive. In his foreword, Dr. Wagner states that the “book comprises a rich variety of material,perspectives, insights and assessments. Valid information can be found there for researchers, for students in the field, for teachers, for managers and for politicians who are looking forreliable knowledge”

eHealth and IMIA's Strategic Planning Process - IMIA conference introductory address.

Science.gov (United States)

Murray, Peter; Haux, Reinhold; Lorenzi, Nancy

2008-01-01

The International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA) is the only organization in health and biomedical informatics which is fully international in scope, bridging the academic, health practice, education, and health industry worlds through conferences, working groups, special interest groups and publications. Authored by the IMIA Interim Vice President for Strategic Planning Implementation and co-authored by the current IMIA President and the IMIA Past-President, the intention of this paper is to introduce IMIA's current strategic planning process and to set this process in relation to 'eHealth: Combining Health Telematics, Telemedicine, Biomedical Engineering and Bioinformatics to the Edge', the theme of this conference. From the viewpoint of an international organization such as IMIA, an eHealth strategy needs to be considered in a comprehensive way, including broadly stimulating high-quality health and biomedical informatics research and education, as well as providing support to bridging outcomes towards a new practice of health care in a changing world.

“What Motivates Her”: Motivations for Considering Labial Reduction Surgery as Recounted on Women's Online Communities and Surgeons' Websites

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sandra Zwier, PhD

2014-04-01

Conclusions: Feelings of emotional and psychosexual distress in addition to functional distress are a highly prevalent motivation among women considering labial reduction surgery. Emotional distress appears to be greater and more freely emphasized when women communicate on online communities, while functional issues appear to receive greater notice on surgery provider's websites. Zwier S. “What motivates her”: Motivations for considering labial reduction surgery as recounted on women's online communities and surgeons' websites. Sex Med 2014;2:16–23.

Adoption of Online Purchasing Methods in Communities and its Socio-Economic Implications in Regional Central Queensland, Australia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

W. J. Taylor

2004-05-01

Full Text Available This paper analyses the general trends of online purchasing in Central Queensland (CQ communities during 1999-2002 and identifies the socio-economic factors affecting online purchasing activities. The Online Purchasing Indicator, defined as a combination of percentages of online purchasers and of regular purchasers (>one item/month within a group, is applied to compare these activities between these two groups. The study identifies that four factors, namely ‘personal attributes’, ‘knowledge’, ‘trust’ and ‘need’ may play important roles in online purchasing decisions. The research found that regional economic bleeding associated with low local adoption failing to provide justification for local business to adopt electronic purchasing support has not yet reached significant levels.

Community water fluoridation online: an analysis of the digital media ecosystem.

Science.gov (United States)

Helmi, Mohammad; Spinella, Mary Kate; Seymour, Brittany

2018-03-30

Research demonstrates the safety and efficacy of community water fluoridation (CWF). Yet, the digitization of communication has triggered the spread of inaccurate information online. The purpose of this study was to analyze patterns of CWF information dissemination by a network of sources on the web. We used Media Cloud, a searchable big data platform of over 550 million stories from 50 thousand sources, along with tools to analyze that archive. We generated a network of fluoridation publishers using Media Cloud's keyword identification from August 1, 2015 to July 31, 2016. We defined the media type and sentiment toward CWF for each source and generated a network map of the most influential sources during our study period based on hyperlinking activity. Media Cloud detected a total of 980 stories from 325 different sources related to water fluoridation. We identified nine different media types participating in the dissemination of information: academic, government, scientific group, natural medicine, blogs, mainstream media, advocacy groups, user-generated (e.g., YouTube), and "other." We detected five sub-networks within the overall fluoridation network map, each with its own characteristics. Twenty-one percent of sources were pro-fluoridation, receiving 57 percent of all inlinks, 22 percent of sources were anti-fluoridation, and the rest were neutral (54 percent). The dominant neutral sentiment of the network may signify that anti- and pro-sides of the debate are viewed as balanced, not just in number but also in quality of information. Despite high inlinks to pro-sources, anti-fluoridation sentiment maintains influence online. © 2018 American Association of Public Health Dentistry.

Navigating digital publics for playful production: A cross-case analysis of two interest-driven online communities

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ksenia A. Korobkova

2016-05-01

Full Text Available This article argues that the set of skills and strategies associated with managing digital publics online represent an emergent literacy practice of importance to literacy researchers and educators. Drawing on two case studies of online communities popular with contemporary youth to learn, play, and socialize, we articulate how youth participants strategically negotiate multiple audiences online with varying levels of publicity in order to achieve learning outcomes. In one case, players of a popular production-centered video game share their content in ways that garner the specific kind of audience and feedback they need for their projects. In another, members of an online fan fiction community analyze and negotiate expectations of their audience in order to craft media that garners attention and sustains readership. Both examples identify how skills centered on navigating and managing publics – that is, multiple audiences that are permeable across a wider public online – constitute a recognizable and important “new literacy” in digitally mediated learning environments. We situate our empirical studies in sociocultural theories of learning and historicize the work in contemporary digital cultures and the general move from the writer-reader relationship to writer-audience relationships to more complex relationships within digital publics. The article ends with considerations for literacy researchers, policymakers, and practitioners interested in technology-mediated practices of today’s youth.

European Economic Community/the European energy conference

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

1979-03-30

European Economic Community/the European energy conference (a meeting of the energy ministers of the nine member countries), held at Brussels on 3/27/79, was a continuation of the EEC Council meeting held at Paris on 3/12-13/79. Proposals for measures to be taken by the member countries included support for exploration, especially geophysical prospecting for oil off the east coast of Greenland, at a cost of 3.5 million units of account (UC); modification of the regulations for crude oil distribution among the EEC member countries in case of a supply crisis; a second series of 36 energy-conservation demonstration projects, to cost 15,626,320 UC and be undertaken in 1979-83; and the UK proposal to call for bids on the first series of 17 projects, costing 5,779,000 UC and adopted in Dec. 1978, before discussing the second series. Six of the 36 projects are French; they involve heat pumps and hybrid nuclear-electric vehicles and space-heating systems. A report on the current status of coal projects was given, and problems with fast-breeder reactors were discussed.

Introduction into the Virtual Olympic Games Framework for online communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Stoilescu, Dorian

2009-06-01

This paper presents the design of the Virtual Olympic Games Framework (VOGF), a computer application designated for athletics, health care, general well-being, nutrition and fitness, which offers multiple benefits for its participants. A special interest in starting the design of the framework was in exploring how people can connect and participate together using existing computer technologies (i.e. gaming consoles, exercise equipment with computer interfaces, devices of measuring health, speed, force and distance and Web 2.0 applications). A stationary bike set-up offering information to users about their individual health and athletic performances has been considered as a starting model. While this model is in the design stage, some preliminary findings are encouraging, suggesting the potential for various fields: sports, medicine, theories of learning, technologies and cybercultural studies. First, this framework would allow participants to perform a variety of sports and improve their health. Second, this would involve creating an online environment able to store health information and sport performances correlated with accessing multi-media data and research about performing sports. Third, participants could share experiences with other athletes, coaches and researchers. Fourth, this framework also provides support for the research community in their future investigations.

The role of the trainer in online courses

OpenAIRE

Dias, Ana Augusta

2001-01-01

This article describes the main challenges faced by teachers and trainers when guiding or "tutoring" online courses. The focus is on their emerging role as e-tutors or e-trainers. The challenges are related with the processes of orientation, guidance and monitoring e-learners within an e-course. European Union DGXXII - Education and Training, Leoardo da VINCI Programme "Trainers Training for Virtual Learning Communities" ( ttVLC)

International Conference on Nuclear Security: Enhancing Global Efforts. Summary of an International Conference

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2014-01-01

The International Conference on Nuclear Security: Enhancing Global Efforts was organized by the IAEA and held in Vienna on 1-5 July 2013. The conference was organized in cooperation with the following organizations and initiatives: the European Union; the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism (GICNT); the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL); the Institute of Nuclear Materials Management (INMM); the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI); the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE); the Partnership for Global Security; the Police Community of the Americas (AMERIPOL); the United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute (UNICRI); the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC); the World Institute for Nuclear Security (WINS); the World Nuclear Association (WNA); and the World Nuclear Transport Institute (WNTI). A total of 34 ministers participated in the ministerial session of the conference. Altogether, the conference attracted more than 1300 registered participants from 125 IAEA Member States and 21 organizations. The aim of the conference was to review the international community's experience and achievements to date in strengthening nuclear security, to enhance the understanding of current approaches to nuclear security worldwide and identify trends, and to provide a global forum for ministers, policymakers and senior officials to formulate views on future directions and priorities for nuclear security. This book contains the President's Summary of the conference and a summary of the ministerial session, the full text of the ministerial declaration adopted by the conference and summaries of the main conference sessions. The attached CD-ROM contains the full conference programme, the list of conference participants, the national statements from the ministerial session and a selection of papers

Transportation vision search conference and literature review

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Vanderwagen, J.

1995-11-01

The economic dependence on the use of cars or trucks and land use planning was discussed at a conference held on June 3-4, 1995, to bring together decision makers and diverse stakeholders to develop a shared vision for reducing CO 2 emissions from the transportation sector in Ontario. This report attempted to summarize the plenary presentations for each of the steps of the conference (.i.e., the desirable future; constraints and opportunities; and action planning). It was pointed out that choices for alternative forms of travel are not as attractive to the public as travelling by car, therefore automotive fuels remain a significant contributor to CO 2 emissions. One of the recommendation made was to redesign cities and communities that are bike and walking friendly and auto unfriendly. Communities in the United States and Europe which have followed this example were described. Another frequently voiced suggestion was that the rail system should be encouraged as a form of internodal transportation. It was also suggested that rural transportation systems should be designed to support the rural community and rural economy, not commuter travel to urban centres, or reverse commuting to factories in the middle of nowhere. refs., tabs., figs

Clinical management of borderline tumours of the ovary - experience from the "Berlin online tumour conference for gynaecological malignancies".

Science.gov (United States)

Sehouli, Jalid; Oskay-Oezcelik, Guelten; Pietzner, Klaus; Chen, Frank; Coumbos, Alexandra; Darb-Esfahani, Silvia; Schuback, Beatrix; Heinrich, Georg; Kronenberger, Christel; Lorsbach, Michael; Lichtenegger, Werner; Chekerov, Radoslav

2010-05-01

Borderline ovarian tumour (BOT) represents a rare and special tumour entity. Despite a generally favourable prognosis for patients with BOT, the presence of invasive peritoneal implants decreases the survival rate to 30-50%. In contrast to ovarian cancer, only few data exist concerning the current clinical management of patients with BOT. For this reason, the present analyses were performed for patients with BOT who were admitted into our online tumor conference for patients with gynaecological malignancies. Based on the results discussed in this article, the current aspects and problems regarding the diagnostic, surgical and conservative treatment and aftercare management of patients with BOT are considered.

The Technology Enhanced Conference - A Board Game!

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Pedersen, Annette

ITMEDIA at the University of Copenhagen have been working with taking the academic conference online for years. Streaming events, using backchannel chat systems and Twitter, producing introductory pre-event videos, setting up audio debates with keynotes to enrich and prolong the conference...... aid: turning it into a board game simply called The Conference Game. By making a children's board game, we let organizers play around with the options, get an overview – and the game element makes it just a little bit less dangerous, and more fun to play around with new technologies. Reception has...

Establishing a Virtual Community of Practice in Simulation: The Value of Social Media.

Science.gov (United States)

Thoma, Brent; Brazil, Victoria; Spurr, Jesse; Palaganas, Janice; Eppich, Walter; Grant, Vincent; Cheng, Adam

2018-04-01

Professional development opportunities are not readily accessible for most simulation educators, who may only connect with simulation experts at periodic and costly conferences. Virtual communities of practice consist of individuals with a shared passion who communicate via virtual media to advance their own learning and that of others. A nascent virtual community of practice is developing online for healthcare simulation on social media platforms. Simulation educators should consider engaging on these platforms for their own benefit and to help develop healthcare simulation educators around the world. Herein, we describe this developing virtual community of practice and offer guidance to assist educators to engage, learn, and contribute to the growth of the community.

A Qualitative Analysis of Faculty and Student Perceptions of Effective Online Class Communities Using Herzberg's Motivator-Hygiene Factors

Science.gov (United States)

Costello, Rebecca; Welch, S. A.

2014-01-01

This article describes a qualitative approach in understanding factors that are evident in effective online class communities. Instructors and students in the same class were asked about their perceptions regarding what constitutes an effective online experience. The analysis was done using both Herzberg's (1962, 1965) motivator-hygiene factors…

An Empirical Investigation of Student Acceptance of Synchronous E-Learning in an Online University

Science.gov (United States)

Kang, Minseok; Shin, Won sug

2015-01-01

This study proposes an extended technology acceptance model to predict acceptance of synchronous e-learning by examining relationships among variables associated with factors influencing the technology acceptance of synchronous e-learning. Learners at an online university participated through an online survey; there were 251 respondents in all.…

Online Fællesskaber

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gotved, Stine

2017-01-01

Online fællesskaber er en organiseringsform på internettet, der har mange variationer (kaldes også netfællesskab, online community og virtual community). Grundlæggende handler det om menneskeligt samvær og kommunikation om et fælles formål gennem computerens mediering....

Understanding Information Sharing Among Scientists Through a Professional Online Community: Analyses on Interaction Patterns and Contents

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Shin, Eun-Ja

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Even through many professional organizations increasingly use Q&A sites in their online communities for information sharing, there are few studies which examine what is really going on in the Q&A activities in professional online communities (POC. This study aims to examine the interaction patterns and contents posted in the Q&A site of a POC, KOSEN, a science and technology online community in South Korea, focusing on how actively scientific information and knowledge are shared. The interaction patterns among the participants were identified through social network analysis (SNA and the contents in the Q&As were examined by content analysis. The results show that the overall network indicated a moderate level of participation and connection and answerers especially tended to be active. Also, there are different interaction patterns depending on academic fields. Relatively few participants were posting leaders who seemed to steer the overall interactions. Furthermore, some content related to manipulation and explanation for experiments, which are in urgent need, seem to be posted in the sites more frequently with more amounts. Combining both SNA and content analysis, this study demonstrated how actively information and knowledge is shared and what types of contents are exchanged. The findings have practical implications for POC managers and practitioners.

eSports Gaming and You

Science.gov (United States)

Engerman, Jason A.; Hein, Robert J.

2017-01-01

Digital gaming communities are nuanced and developing. The eSports community has advanced in noticeable ways and represents the highest form of online competitive play for digital gaming environments. Due to the high stakes nature of eSports, its participants sit on the very edge of strategic planning boundaries and push the ceiling of…

Design of an online health-promoting community: negotiating user community needs with public health goals and service capabilities.

Science.gov (United States)

Ekberg, Joakim; Timpka, Toomas; Angbratt, Marianne; Frank, Linda; Norén, Anna-Maria; Hedin, Lena; Andersen, Emelie; Gursky, Elin A; Gäre, Boel Andersson

2013-07-04

An online health-promoting community (OHPC) has the potential to promote health and advance new means of dialogue between public health representatives and the general public. The aim of this study was to examine what aspects of an OHPC that are critical for satisfying the needs of the user community and public health goals and service capabilities. Community-based participatory research methods were used for data collection and analysis, and participatory design principles to develop a case study OHPC for adolescents. Qualitative data from adolescents on health appraisals and perspectives on health information were collected in a Swedish health service region and classified into categories of user health information exchange needs. A composite design rationale for the OHPC was completed by linking the identified user needs, user-derived requirements, and technical and organizational systems solutions. Conflicts between end-user requirements and organizational goals and resources were identified. The most prominent health information needs were associated to food, exercise, and well-being. The assessment of the design rationale document and prototype in light of the regional public health goals and service capabilities showed that compromises were needed to resolve conflicts involving the management of organizational resources and responsibilities. The users wanted to discuss health issues with health experts having little time to set aside to the OHPC and it was unclear who should set the norms for the online discussions. OHPCs can be designed to satisfy both the needs of user communities and public health goals and service capabilities. Compromises are needed to resolve conflicts between users' needs to discuss health issues with domain experts and the management of resources and responsibilities in public health organizations.

Penerapan Pasal 1320 KUH Perdata terhadap Jual Beli secara Online (E-Commerce

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Herniwati ,

2015-07-01

Full Text Available Pasal 1320 KUHPerdata mengatur tentang syarat-syarat sah perjanjian. Ketentuan Pasal 1320 ini berlaku terhadap perjanjian jual beli secara konvensional dan perjanjian jual beli melalui online (internet Dewasa ini Perjanjian jual beli melalui online sangat diminati oleh kaum muda dan kaum ibu rumah tangga.Transaksi jual beli secara online atau disebut dengan e-commerce yang dilakukan melalui  media elektronik sudah sangat populer. Para pembeli yang akan membeli barang-barang atau jasa yang ditawarkan oleh penjual (pedagang. Dengan perkembangan teknologi informasi ini akan berdampak terhadap perkembangan aturan-aturan hukum yang ada. Atauran hukum yang diatur dalam KUHPerdata mengatur tentang  syarat-syarat perjanjian. Pasal 1320 KUHPerdata mengatur tentang syarat-syarat sah perjanjian. Ketentuan ini juga berlaku terhadap transaksi jual beli secara online. Ketentuan dalam KUHPerdata ini diperkuat  dengan adanya  Undang-Undang Nomor  11 Tahun 2008 Tentang Informasi dan Transaksi  Elektronik yang mengatur tentang transaksi elektronik.Kata Kunci:  Jual Beli, e-commerce

Ecology Art Education On-Line: A World Community of Old Trees, A Story of the Research

Science.gov (United States)

Julian, June

1997-01-01

"A World Community of Old Trees," http://www.nyu.edu/projects/julian/, is the Internet research component of the doctoral dissertation, "Ecology Art Education On-Line: A World Community of Old Trees." It is the first study in the discipline of Art Education to use the World Wide Web to transmit and receive data for doctoral…

Curating Research: e-Merging New Roles and Responsibilities in the European Landscape (Conference Report

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Inge Angevaare

2009-11-01

Full Text Available On 17 April 2009 LIBER, the Koninklijke Bibliotheek (KB and the Netherlands Coalition for Digital Preservation (NCDD co-organised LIBER’s first workshop on digital curation/preservation, providing an introduction to the theme of digital curation and different perspectives on the roles research libraries can and/or must play in keeping the digital records of science safe for future generations. Speakers included Eileen Fenton (Portico, Dale Peters (DRIVER, Maria Heijne (TU Delft Library, Jeffrey van der Hoeven (KB, PARSE.insight and ninety workshop attendees. The paper includes the conference report and some results of the PARSE.insight online survey into digital preservation practices of LIBER libraries.

Examining the Key Factors Affecting e-Service Quality of Small Online Apparel Businesses in Malaysia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Che Nawi Noorshella

2015-04-01

Full Text Available e-Service quality (eSQ is increasingly recognized as an important aspect, as well as the key to determining the competitive advantage and factor in the long-term retention of firms operating online. This study, therefore, is aimed at identifying the key determinants of eSQ among the small online apparel businesses in Malaysia. This study used a cross-sectional design, and data were collected from 765 customers who purchased apparel online at the point-of-purchase. Findings of this study indicate that “product information quality,” “website design,” “security and privacy,” and “expected consumer service” are the key determinants of eSQ among small online apparel businesses in Malaysia. The implication for the owner-managers of the apparel businesses in Malaysia is that they must be aware of the significance of the key eSQ indicators while designing their businesses, to attract and retain customers.

Awareness of eSafety and Potential Online Dangers among Children and Teenagers

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gila Cohen Zilka

2017-09-01

Background\tThe study examined eSafety among children and teenagers from their own perspectives, through evaluations of their awareness level of eSafety and of potential online dangers. Methodology: This is a mixed-method study with both quantitative and qualitative elements. The study includes questionnaires and interviews. A total of 345 participants from Israel completed questionnaires; 90 children and teenagers were interviewed from among the participants. Contribution: The study examined the awareness of children and youths of safe online surfing. It also examined the degree of exposure of children and youths to positive and negative aspects of the Internet. This study illustrates the dual potential of Internet use within the context of eSafety, as seen through the eyes of children and teenagers. Characteristics of use of the Internet are liable to increase the danger to and the bullying of youths and by youths in the digital domain. It also demonstrates the promises of using the Internet for productive learning and leisure activities. Findings: Findings show that the children and teenagers who participated in the study reported a medium-high level of awareness. Issues that participants were concerned about included avoiding contact with strangers and cyberbullying, not necessarily by strangers, but also by friends. Recommendations for Practitioners\t: It is important to examine how children perceive online events for the purpose of examining their statements regarding eSafety and the way they view problematic or dangerous online events, as well as how they believe they can cope with them. Recommendation for Researchers: The study recommends incorporating in future studies individual case studies and allowing participants to express how they perceive complex online situations. Impact on Society: This study illustrates the dual potential, positive and negative aspects, of Internet use within the context of eSafety, as seen through the eyes of children and

A Netnographic Study of Entrepreneurial Traits: Evaluating classic typologies using the crowdsourcing algorithm of an online community

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Marcos Cerqueira Lima

2014-09-01

Full Text Available This paper evaluates how the advices of experienced entrepreneurs to young start-up creators in an online community reflect entrepreneurship traits commonly found in conceptual typologies. The overall goal is to contrast and evaluate existing models based on evidence from an online community. This should facilitate future studies to improve current typologies by ranking entrepreneurial traits according to perceived relevance. In order to achieve these objectives, we have conducted a “netnographic study” (i.e., the qualitative analysis of web-based content of 96 answers to the question “What is the best advice for a young, first-time startup CEO?” on Quora.com. Relying on Quora’s ranking algorithm (based on crowdsourcing of votes and community prestige, we focused on the top 50% of answers (which we shall call the “above Quora 50” category considered the most relevant by its 2000+ followers and 120,000+ viewers. We used Nvivo as a Qualitative Data Analysis Software to code all the entries into the literature categories. These codes were then later retrieved using matrix queries to compare the incidence of traits and the perceived relevance of answers. We found that among the 50% highest ranking answers on Quora, the following traits are perceived as the most important for young entrepreneurs to develop: management style, attitude in interpersonal relations, vision, self-concept, leadership style, marketing, market and customer knowledge, innovation, technical knowledge and skills, attitude to growth, ability to adapt, purpose and relations system. These results could lead to improving existing typologies and creating new models capable of better identifying people with the highest potential to succeed in new venture creation.

Viewpoint Reading Conference Recommendations in a Wider ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Viewpoint Reading Conference Recommendations in a Wider Context of Social Change. ... Southern African Journal of Environmental Education. Journal Home · ABOUT THIS JOURNAL ... AJOL African Journals Online. HOW TO USE AJOL.

Pricing and sales tax collection policies for e-cigarette starter kits and disposable products sold online.

Science.gov (United States)

Cuomo, Raphael E; Miner, Angela; Mackey, Tim K

2015-10-23

Previous studies have examined marketing characteristics of e-cigarettes sold online and others have examined e-cigarettes pricing in retail (non-Internet) settings. This study expands on these findings by examining pricing and marketing characteristics of interest among e-cigarette online vendors. Structured web searches were conducted from August-September 2014 to identify popular e-cigarette Internet vendors. We then collected pricing data (e-cigarette starter kits and disposables), sales tax collection policies and other vendor marketing characteristics. Average price for each product category was then compared with marketing characteristics using linear regression for continuous variables and independent t-tests for binary variables. Our searches yielded 44 e-cigarette Internet vendors of which 77% (n = 34) sold a total of 238 starter kit offerings (Mprice = $55.89). Half (n = 22) sold disposable types of e-cigarettes (Mprice = $7.17 p/e-cigarette) at a price lower than reported elsewhere in retail settings. Average disposable e-cigarette prices were also significantly higher for vendors displaying more health warning notices (P = 0.001). Only 46% disclosed sales tax collection policies and only 39% collected sales tax in their state of business. This study expands on current understanding of e-cigarette pricing and availability online and finds variation in e-cigarette pricing may be influenced by type of product, use of online health warnings and vendor sales tax collection policies. It also finds that e-cigarette online access and availability may be impacted by a combination of pricing and marketing strategies uniquely different from e-cigarette retail settings that requires further study and targeted policy-making. [Cuomo RE, Miner A, Mackey TK. Pricing and sales tax collection policies for e-cigarette starter kits and disposable products sold online. Drug Alcohol Rev 2015]. © 2015 Australasian Professional Society on Alcohol and

Vocational Guidance and Counselling for Young People and Adults in the European Community. Findings of a Conference (Berlin, West Germany, December 7-8, 1989).

Science.gov (United States)

de Vries, Heinz J., Ed.

1990-01-01

This document reports on a conference centered around three topics: vocational guidance in the Member States of the European Community (EC), the "Europeanization" of vocational guidance, and approaches to cross-frontier vocational guidance. Among the recommendations of the conference participants are the following: the tasks of…

A Complex Estimation Function based on Community Reputation for On-line Transaction Systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yu Yang

2012-09-01

Full Text Available A reputation management system is crucial in online transaction systems, in which a reputation function is its central component. We propose a generalized set-theoretic reputation function in this paper, which can be configured to meet various assessment requirements of a wide range of reputation scenarios encountered in online transaction nowadays. We analyze and verify tolerance of this reputation function against various socio-communal reputation attacks. We find the function to be dynamic, customizable and tolerant against different attacks. As such it can serve well in many online transaction systems such as e-commerce websites, online group activities, and P2P systems.

Proceedings of the International Association for Development of the Information Society (IADIS) International Conference on e-Learning (Madeira, Portugal, July 1-4, 2016)

Science.gov (United States)

Nunes, Miguel Baptista, Ed.; McPherson, Maggie, Ed.

2016-01-01

These proceedings contain the papers of the International Conference e-Learning 2016, which was organised by the International Association for Development of the Information Society, 1-3 July, 2016. This conference is part of the Multi Conference on Computer Science and Information Systems 2016, 1-4 July. The e-Learning (EL) 2016 conference aims…

International conference on string theory

CERN Document Server

2017-01-01

The Strings 2017 conference is part of the "Strings" series of annual conferences, that bring the entire string theory community together. It will include reviews of major developments in the field, and specialized talks on specific topics. There will also be several public lectures given by conference participants, a pre-Strings school at the Technion, and a post-Strings workshop at the Weizmann Institute.

Online communities of practice and their role in educational development: a systematic appraisal.

Science.gov (United States)

Swift, Lynn

2014-04-01

Practice teachers and academics have a role in developing knowledge and promoting evidence-based practice with their students in a supportive and creative learning environment. Recent advances in technology are enabling communities of practice' (CoPs) to be developed online and may present a valuable opportunity to form greater connections between educators. To explore this idea, the author conducted a systematic appraisal of published evidence relating to the impact of using an online CoP (OCoP) to develop knowledge among healthcare educators. Three academic databases were targeted for articles and the search retrieved nine articles that were analysed for quality. The findings identified that an OCoP offers a 'polycontextual' environment that can enhance knowledge development, strengthen social ties and build social capital. Communities that support tacit knowledge development, information sharing and problem solving are most valued and existing information and communication technology (ICT) tools can be used to promote usability and accessibility. Recognising the value of tacit knowledge and using ICT for educational development within workload hours will require a shift in cultural thinking at both an individual and organisational level.