Search results

The purpose of this paper is to explore barriers; the mediating role of usability; and the moderating effects of subjective norms, personal innovativeness, self-efficacy and perceived image on users’ attitudes toward loyalty to Internet banking (IB) in Iran.

Based on the consumer data collected from a survey, structural equations modeling and path analysis were used to test the research model.

The results revealed that “low perceived usefulness” and “low perceived ease of use” both had negative effects on users’ attitudes. “Low awareness” and “low system compatibility” were found to be the main factors impeding users’ attitudes toward loyalty to IB. “Perceived usefulness” showed no mediating role in the relationship between ease of use and users’ attitudes. At last, all concerned moderators moderated the relationships between ease of use/usefulness and users’ attitudes.

The sample was only composed of IB users of one Iranian bank, and non-users were not studied.

Past studies have seldom examined the role of individual drivers such as personal innovativeness and self-efficacy and social drivers such as subjective norms and perceived image as moderating variables in the context of developing countries.

The purpose of this paper is to explore barriers, the mediating role of usability and the moderating effects of self-efficacy and perceived image on consumers’ attitudes toward use of mobile banking (MB) in Iran.

Based on the consumer data collected through a survey, structural equations modeling and path analysis were employed to test the research model.

The results revealed that “system compatibility” was found to be the main factor affecting users’ attitudes toward use of MB. “Resistance” showed a significant negative effect on both ease of use and usefulness. “Perceived usefulness” mediated the relationship between ease of use and users’ attitudes. At last, contrary to self-efficacy which showed no significant effect, perceived image moderated the relationships between usefulness and attitude.

The sample was only composed of MB users and non-users were not studied.

Past studies have seldom examined the role of individual drivers like self-efficacy and social drivers like perceived image as moderating variables in the context of developing countries.

The present study aims to explore the concepts involved in the relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and customer and employee satisfaction in service industries.

The research literature over the recent decade has been analyzed using a systematic review. Through thematic analysis and coding the findings of the final selected articles, the authors presented an integrative framework of the relationship between CSR and the satisfaction of critical stakeholders of service companies, namely, customers and employees.

The research framework encompasses six main categories called CSR, satisfaction, moderators, conditional variables, contextual variables and satisfaction outcomes. All categories but CSR are divided into customer and employee sections to make the research framework further comprehensible.

The results show that in service industries, employees need as much attention as customers, and CSR efforts to satisfy customers and employees can lead to several positive outputs for companies.

Failure of service companies to commit to their social responsibility may harm the environment, society’s ethics and laws and long-term corporate profitability. On the other hand, adherence to CSR can lead to social development and economic growth.

This study is one of the most comprehensive studies in the field of CSR and satisfaction, which simultaneously considers the two key stakeholders of a service company. In addition, it provides valuable avenues for further studies.

This study aims to investigate drivers of co-branding, and the relative strength of these drivers within the Persian Gulf Pro League (PGPL). The study examines sport sponsorship, and specifically the relationship between professional football teams and on-field apparel sponsors.

Sixteen experts participated in semi-structured interviews and ranked the co-branding drivers. The expert opinions were organized into estimates and triangular fuzzy numbers were established before the Mamdani Fuzzy Inference System converted the fuzzy outputs into crisp output values using the Centroid method. Next, the rankings of the drivers by the same 16 participants were analyzed using the analytical hierarchy process (AHP).

The study identified four main factors with 19 indicators: brand management (i.e. enhancing brand value, utilizing the knowledge and experience of partner brands, brand position, brand identity, brand equity and brand image), partner relationships (i.e. satisfaction, mutual trust, commitment, common interest, product reliability and innovative strategies), marketing factors (i.e. marketing mix, market position, competitive advantage and entry into new domestic markets) and supporting factors (i.e. copyright, contracts and social media law). The AHP identified the most influential factors as marketing, partner relationships, brand management and support.

Based on the study’s findings, the authors recommend that PGPL teams adopt a partnership mindset, seek alignment of values and recognize the plurality of stakeholders to a sponsorship and their relationships to each other. The study highlights the challenges of co-branding activities in a developing country where trademark laws are not well developed.

The purpose of this paper is to determine the second victims’ experience and its related factors among medical staff.

This research is a cross-sectional study that was conducted in public hospitals of Sanandaj, west of Iran, in 2017. The sample consisted of 338 medical staff including physicians, nurses and mid-wives. A self-report questionnaire was used for data collection. Descriptive statistics, cross-tabs and χ² test were used for data analysis using SPSS20.

A total of 51.5 percent (n=174) of the medical staff had experienced medical error in the past year, of which 90.2 percent (n=157) had at least one of the symptoms of “second victims.” Tachycardia and sleep disturbances were the most commonly referred physical symptoms with 73 and 51.7 percent, respectively. Also, repetitive/intrusive memories and fear of reputation damage were the most commonly referred psychosocial symptoms with 68.3 and 51.7 percent, respectively. The experience of physical and psychosocial symptoms was different according to the occupational category. In addition, there was a significant association between the experience of physical symptoms with the hospital administrators’ awareness of medical errors and the consequences of medical errors for patients.

Adoption of coping strategies, including learning from medical errors as well as hospital administrators’ support from second victims, is recommended. It is also suggested that medical staff be informed about the consequences of medical errors as well as physical and psychological symptoms of second victims so that they can ask for help from managers and colleagues when the symptoms occur.

This study outlines the prevalence, the most psychological and physical symptoms, and the demographic and occupational factors associated with the second victim phenomenon in medical staff. Also, the most important strategies for coping with this phenomenon are prioritized from the perspective of medical staff.

The purpose of this paper is to revise the Kano evaluation table and separating indifference attributes in order to develop satisfaction and dissatisfaction indexes.

The indifference requirements have been separated and reclassified, and after revising Kano satisfaction and dissatisfaction indexes based on the new evaluation table, the developed Kano model has been examined in the city of Isfahan regarding attributes of candidates in the presidential election of 2013.

According to the new classification, the indifference attributes can be separated into seven types. The results of the case study also show that among 20 priorities of the presidential candidates, payment of subsidy, offering loan and financial facilities are must-be attributes; protecting investment and national production, export incentives and increasing national unity are attractive attributes; and the remaining are one-dimensional attributes.

The case study implies that the findings are dependent on the cultural and social context of the respondents. On the other hand, the findings of Kano model analysis are limited to short-time periods.

This research is typically unique in separating indifference attributes and in revising the satisfaction and dissatisfaction indexes of the Kano model. Practically, the application of the Kano model in the presidential election is also a new subject.

The purpose of this study is to demonstrate that using appropriate values for fictitious parameters is very important in dynamic relation methods. It will be shown that a better scheme can be made by modifying these terms.

Former research studies have proposed diverse values for fictitious parameters. These factors are very essential and highly affect structural analyses’ abilities. In this paper, the fictitious masses in ten previous well-known schemes are replaced with each other. These formulations lead to the extra 41 different new procedures.

To compare the skills of the created processes with those of the ten previous ones, 14 benchmark problems with geometrical nonlinear behaviour are analysed. The performances’ evaluations are based on the number of iterations and analysis time. Considering these two criteria, the score of each technique is found for the ranking assessments.

To solve a static problem by using a dynamic relaxation (DR) scheme, it should be first converted to a dynamic space. Using the appropriate values for fictitious terms is very important in this approach. The fictitious mass matrix and damping factor play the most effective role in the process stability. Besides, the fictitious time step is necessary for improving the method convergence rate.

Different famous DR procedures were compared with each other previously. These solvers used their original assumptions for the imaginary mass and damping. So far, no attempt has been made to change the fictitious parameters of the well-known DR methods. As these fictitious factors highly affect structural analyses’ efficiencies, these solvers are formulated again by using new parameters. In this study, the fictitious masses of ten previous famous methods are replaced with each other. These substitutions give 51 different procedures.

It is concluded that the present formulations lead to more effective and favourable methods than the solvers with previous assumptions.

This study aimed at developing and testing a model to evaluate employee performance in Isfahan municipality.

A mixed-method design is applied in this study. To extract the model, a semi-structured interview based on the thematic analysis approach was employed. The qualitative data were obtained using a researcher-made questionnaire from a sample of 12 municipal experts selected based on purposive sampling. In the quantitative phase, the sample consisted of 76 managers and interim managers. The validity of the questionnaire was determined by the content validity index, while the structural validity was tested based on structural equation modeling using SmartPLS software. The reliability of the questionnaire was confirmed using Cronbach's alpha and composite reliability indices.

The factors obtained in the qualitative model included performance evaluation criteria, the desired time interval for performance evaluation, results announcement, performance evaluation approach, performance evaluation method and evaluator-related variables. There should have been an agreement between evaluators and those who were evaluated in all components of the model. In the quantitative section, performance evaluation criteria, evaluators, the evaluation method and time interval were confirmed with coefficients of 0.871, 0.815, 0.646 and 0.615, respectively.

The novelty of this study is that it uses a mixed-method research approach to extract a performance evaluation model that is specific to the Isfahan municipality.

The novelty of this study is that it uses a mixed-method research approach to extract a performance evaluation model that is specific to the Isfahan municipality.

This study aims to assess and decompose the sustainable development using the 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) in Iran in 2018, for proposing agenda-setting of public policy.

It ranks the SDGs not only in Iran but also in the region and the world to reveal the synergetic effects.

Based on the results, subaltern-populace generally suffers from the hegemonic domination of ruling elite-bourgeois, lack of strong institutions, heterogeneous policy networks and lack of advocacy role of non-governmental organizations, due to no transparency, issues in law or no rule of law, no stringent regulation, rent, suppression and Mafia, all leading to corruption and injustice.

To stop the loop of corruption-injustice, Iran should homogenize the structure of the policy network. Furthermore, the failed SDGs of the three-geographic analysis are the same in a character; all of them propose SDG 3, good health and well-being as a serious failed goal.

In this regard, strong evidence is the pandemic Coronavirus, COVID 19 since 2019, due to its highly-disastrous consequences in early 2020 where the public policymakers could not adopt policies promptly in the glob, particularly in Iran.

In Iran, in addition to this, the malfunction of health is rooted in “subjective well-being” and “traffic deaths,” respectively. Concerning the transportations system in Iran, it is underscored that it is damaging the sustainable development from all the three pillars of sustainable development including, economic, social and environmental.