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1 – 10 of 106Ryszard Kłeczek and Monika Hajdas
This study aims to investigate how art events can enrich novice visitors by transforming their practices.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to investigate how art events can enrich novice visitors by transforming their practices.
Design/methodology/approach
This research uses an interpretive case study of the art exhibition “1/1/1/1/1” in the Oppenheim gallery in Wroclaw. It draws on multiple sources of evidence, namely, novice visitors’ interviews, observation including photo studies and content analysis of art-makers’ mediation sources. This study is an example of contextual theorizing from case studies and participatory action research with researchers as change agents.
Findings
The evidence highlights that aesthetic values and experiences are contextual to practices and are transformable into other values. The findings illustrate the role of practice theory in studying how art-makers inspire the transformation of practices, including values driving the latter.
Research limitations/implications
The findings provide implications for transformations of co-creating contextual values in contemporary visual art consumption and customer experience management.
Practical implications
Practical implications to arts organizations are also provided regarding cultural mediation conducted by art-makers. Exhibition makers should explain the meanings of the particularly visible artefacts to allow visitors to develop a congruent understanding of the meanings. The explanations should not provide ready answers or solutions to the problem art-makers suggest to rethink.
Social implications
The social implication of our findings is that stakeholders in artistic ventures may undertake adequate, qualified and convergent actions to maintain or transform the defined interactive practices between them in co-creating contextual aesthetic values.
Originality/value
The study provides new insights into co-creating values in practices in the domain of contemporary art exhibitions by bringing the practice theory together with an audience enrichment category, thus illustrating how novice visitors get enriched by transforming their practices led by contextual values of “liking” and “understanding”.
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This study aims to explore aesthetic atmospheres and their affordances in urban squares to advance knowledge on the research and design of attractive living environments.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to explore aesthetic atmospheres and their affordances in urban squares to advance knowledge on the research and design of attractive living environments.
Design/methodology/approach
Descriptions of pleasant and unpleasant experiences of urban squares were collected using qualitative questionnaires with open-ended questions. The theoretical framework and the lens of aesthetic affordances were applied to pinpoint and understand the connections between the place attributes and experiences.
Findings
This study found four distinct aesthetic atmospheres formed by perceived synergies of both the material and immaterial aspects of the environment. It was also found that the atmospheres may shift. A model that shows the aesthetic atmospheres and their potential affordances as layered and emerging is presented.
Research limitations/implications
Everyday aesthetics considered as affordances open new research perspectives for the understanding of what generates attractive living environments – or not.
Practical implications
Aesthetics affordances may provide the design professionals and alike means on how to design places that engender specific aesthetic atmosphere.
Social implications
Gathering and discussing commonplace aesthetic experiences in everyday life may enhance democratic participation in place development among people with different levels of design expertise.
Originality/value
This study combines theories of place with a novel concept of aesthetic affordances to identify distinct aesthetic atmospheres. A holistic overview structure of how the various constituents of aesthetic atmospheres relate to each other provides new ways of studying and understanding urban aesthetic atmospheres.
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Mi Lin, Ana Pereira Roders, Ivan Nevzgodin and Wessel de Jonge
Even if there is a wealth of research highlighting the key role of values and cultural significance for heritage management and, defining specific interventions on built heritage…
Abstract
Purpose
Even if there is a wealth of research highlighting the key role of values and cultural significance for heritage management and, defining specific interventions on built heritage, seldom the relation to their leading values and values hierarchy have been researched. How do values and interventions relate? What values trigger most and least interventions on heritage? How do these values relate and characterize interventions? And what are the values hierarchy that make the interventions on built heritage differ?
Design/methodology/approach
This paper conducts a systematic content analysis of 69 international doctrinal documents – mainly adopted by Council of Europe, UNESCO, and ICOMOS, during 1877 and 2021. The main aim is to reveal and compare the intervention concepts and their definitions, in relation to values. The intensity of the relationship between intervention concepts and values is determined based on the frequency of mentioned values per intervention.
Findings
There were three key findings. First, historic, social, and aesthetical values were the most referenced values in international doctrinal documents. Second, while intervention concepts revealed similar definitions and shared common leading values, their secondary values and values hierarchy, e.g. aesthetical or social values, are the ones influencing the variation on their definitions. Third, certain values show contradictory roles in the same intervention concepts from different documents, e.g. political and age values.
Originality/value
This paper explores a novel comparison between different interventions concepts and definitions, and the role of values. The results can contribute to support further research and practice on clarifying the identified differences.
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Joni Salminen, João M. Santos, Soon-gyo Jung and Bernard J. Jansen
The “what is beautiful is good” (WIBIG) effect implies that observers tend to perceive physically attractive people in a positive light. The authors investigate how the WIBIG…
Abstract
Purpose
The “what is beautiful is good” (WIBIG) effect implies that observers tend to perceive physically attractive people in a positive light. The authors investigate how the WIBIG effect applies to user personas, measuring designers' perceptions and task performance when employing user personas for the design of information technology (IT) solutions.
Design/methodology/approach
In a user experiment, the authors tested six different personas with 235 participants that were asked to develop remote work solutions based on their interaction with a fictitious user persona.
Findings
The findings showed that a user persona's perceived attractiveness was positively correlated with other perceptions of the persona. The personas' completeness, credibility, empathy, likability and usefulness increased with attractiveness. More attractive personas were also perceived as more agreeable, emotionally stable, extraverted and open, and the participants spent more time engaging with personas they perceived attractive. A linguistic analysis indicated that the IT solutions created for more attractive user personas demonstrated a higher degree of affect, but for the most part, task outputs did not vary by the personas' perceived attractiveness.
Research limitations/implications
The WIBIG effect applies when designing IT solutions with user personas, but its effect on task outputs appears limited. The perceived attractiveness of a user persona can impact how designers interact with and engage with the persona, which can influence the quality or the type of the IT solutions created based on the persona. Also, the findings point to the need to incorporate hedonic qualities into the persona creation process. For example, there may be contexts where it is helpful that the personas be attractive; there may be contexts where the attractiveness of the personas is unimportant or even a distraction.
Practical implications
The findings point to the need to incorporate hedonic qualities into the persona creation process. For example, there may be contexts where it is helpful that the personas be attractive; there may be contexts where the attractiveness of the personas is unimportant or even a distraction.
Originality/value
Because personas are created to closely resemble real people, the authors might expect the WIBIG effect to apply. The WIBIG effect might lead decision makers to favor more attractive personas when designing IT solutions. However, despite its potential relevance for decision making with personas, as far as the authors know, no prior study has investigated whether the WIBIG effect extends to the context of personas. Overall, it is important to understand how human factors apply to IT system design with personas, so that the personas can be created to minimize potentially detrimental effects as much as possible.
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Chao Yuan, Xiang Kong and Pinyu Chen
This study aims to examine the role of authenticity in tourists’ destination selection, analyze the factors that influence tourists to form their initial opinions and explore how…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine the role of authenticity in tourists’ destination selection, analyze the factors that influence tourists to form their initial opinions and explore how tourists construct the authenticity of traditional villages. The authors selected Chengkan village in Huizhou district, Huangshan city, as a case. In the study, the authors constructed an attribute-hardware-software research framework and analyzed tourists’ authentic emic experiences from the perspective of constructivism. The findings of this study suggest that tourists’ destination selection is influenced by authenticity. The destination culture brokers who interact with tourists play an essential role in forming authentic experiences. According to differences in how tourists construct authenticity, the study divided tourists into three types: primitive imagination, aesthetic reality and rational cognition. The results of this study provide a deeper understanding of various viewpoints about authenticity research and contribute to the academic discussion on how to understand the authenticity of unique cultural heritage sites such as traditional villages in the context of tourism development.
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Abstract
Purpose
Coastal zone ecological restoration project is of great significance to alleviate marine ecological degradation. Evaluating the effect of coastal ecological restoration projects and identifying the obstacle factors affecting their restoration level can provide an empirical basis for future Marine ecological restoration projects.
Design/methodology/approach
However, due to the initial stage of coastal zone ecological restoration projects, the actual monitoring data of coastal zone ecological restoration is relatively lacking. Based on the CRITIC-TOPSIS (combination of CRITIC method and TOPSIS method) method, combined with the subjective perception of the public and the actual data of the restoration project, this paper proposes an evaluation method of the coastal zone ecological restoration effect to obtain the specific implementation effect of the coastal zone ecological restoration project. The main obstacle factors affecting the evaluation of coastal ecological restoration effect are identified by using the obstacle degree model.
Findings
This paper conducted an empirical study on the restoration of sandy shoreline and coastal wetland in Qinhuangdao city. Based on the data of restoration projects and the subjective perception of ecological restoration by the public in Qinhuangdao city, the research results showed that the coastal zone ecological restoration effect of Qinhuangdao city was general. The quality of the restoration project and the public perception have an important influence on the evaluation of the restoration effect. Improving the quality of the restoration project, strengthening the public's participation in ecological restoration and allowing the public to better participate in the ecological restoration of the coastal zone can improve the effect of ecological restoration of the coastal zone in an all-round way.
Originality/value
The research results of this paper have a guiding role in the ecological restoration of coastal cities in the future, and also have a demonstration and reference role for the assessment of the effect of ecological restoration of coastal zones.
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Othmar Manfred Lehner and Orthodoxia Kyriacou
Current accounting practice tends to split environmental complexities into quantifiable, codified elements, producing codified simplifications of the “complex” in pursuit of…
Abstract
Purpose
Current accounting practice tends to split environmental complexities into quantifiable, codified elements, producing codified simplifications of the “complex” in pursuit of environmental externalities. This has led to standardization, but has done little to motivate organizations to engage in more environmentally-aware behavior that transcends the coercive dimensions of codification. The work of Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) can bring new insights and perspectives to social and environmental accounting (SEA). In discussing Humboldt's philosophy of understanding the interconnectedness between people, their contexts (cultures) and their environment, the authors contribute to the emerging SEA literature on notions of interconnectedness and the web of accountabilities. The authors also explore how a Humboldtian approach may help break through the current epistemological boundaries of SEA by combining accurate measurement with imagery to make the “complex” manageable whilst embracing interconnectedness and hermeneutics.
Design/methodology/approach
In this conceptual paper, the authors humbly draw on Humboldt's legacy and explore the underlying philosophical assumptions of Humboldtian science. The authors then contrast these with current SEA approaches in the literature and derive new insights into their intentionality and practical use.
Findings
Re-examining Humboldt's pioneering work enables us to pinpoint what might be missing from current SEA approaches and debates. Humboldt upheld an “ethics of precision,” which included both measurement accuracy and qualitative relevance, and combined hands-on scientific fieldwork with the aesthetic ideals and interconnectedness of the age of Romanticism. Drawing on Humboldtian science, the authors propose focusing on the interconnectedness of nature and humanity, embracing the qualitative and hermeneutical and including aesthetics and emotion in environmental visualizations.
Originality/value
The paper elucidates why and how Humboldtian science might inform, guide and enhance the emancipatory potential of SEA in the 21st century. Specifically, the authors discuss Humboldt's approach of linking accurate measurement with imagery to convey a sense of interconnectedness.
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Anna Rita Irimiás and Serena Volo
The aim of the study is threefold: understanding the interconnections amongst visual and verbal multimodal communication strategies used in food discourse; identifying the themes…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of the study is threefold: understanding the interconnections amongst visual and verbal multimodal communication strategies used in food discourse; identifying the themes of celebrity chef's food discourse with respect to pro-environmental behaviour; and providing a methodological framework to visually analyse food-themed videos.
Design/methodology/approach
This study uses mise-en-scène and critical discourse and multimodal analyses to gain insights on food discourse from 20 videos shared by a Michelin starred chef on social media platforms.
Findings
Results show that a pro-environmental cooking philosophy challenges the normative discourse on food and educates general audiences and foodies alike. Mise-en-scène and discourse analyses of Instagram visual content reveal that leftovers are central to the ethical message and are intertwined – through the aesthetic of the videos-with concepts of inclusivity, diversity and nourishment.
Practical implications
Chefs, and restaurants, are encouraged to recognise their responsibility as role models, thus able to influence the societal production of food discourse.
Originality/value
The findings provide new insights into the role of a celebrity chef in promoting sustainable food preparation and consumption.
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Alejandro Morales-Vargas, Rafael Pedraza-Jimenez and Lluís Codina
The field of website quality evaluation attracts the interest of a range of disciplines, each bringing its own particular perspective to bear. This study aims to identify the main…
Abstract
Purpose
The field of website quality evaluation attracts the interest of a range of disciplines, each bringing its own particular perspective to bear. This study aims to identify the main characteristics – methods, techniques and tools – of the instruments of evaluation described in this literature, with a specific concern for the factors analysed, and based on these, a multipurpose model is proposed for the development of new comprehensive instruments.
Design/methodology/approach
Following a systematic bibliographic review, 305 publications on website quality are examined, the field's leading authors, their disciplines of origin and the sectors to which the websites being assessed belong are identified, and the methods they employ characterised.
Findings
Evaluations of website quality tend to be conducted with one of three primary focuses: strategic, functional or experiential. The technique of expert analysis predominates over user studies and most of the instruments examined classify the characteristics to be evaluated – for example, usability and content – into factors that operate at different levels, albeit that there is little agreement on the names used in referring to them.
Originality/value
Based on the factors detected in the 50 most cited works, a model is developed that classifies these factors into 13 dimensions and more than 120 general parameters. The resulting model provides a comprehensive evaluation framework and constitutes an initial step towards a shared conceptualization of the discipline of website quality.
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