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In the domain of information science, affordance is a relatively new concept that deserves further exploration. It may serve as a bridge to narrow the research-practice gap that has persisted in information studies. Building upon previous research, we call for a broader concept of affordance that would help researchers understand information practices from an ecological perspective.

The study focuses on conceptualizing affordances for information practices in order to theorize engagement among people, technology, and sociocultural environments. We develop a hierarchical model and a component model to illustrate how key tenets of affordances can be linked with the decomposition of activities and its mechanism. Following this, we describe an illustrative case of a popular Chinese cloud-based music platform to demonstrate the utility of our conceptual frameworks in guiding studies of information practices.

The study proposes to shift the focus of technology affordances, which highlights the features and functions of particular technologies, to the affordances for practices that are enacted through technology and social construction within a sociocultural environment. The illustrative case of the cloud-based music platform shows that the proposed models can provide a structured view of operations, actions and motives for music information practices. The processes of internalization and externalization offer insight into the decomposition of information practice as a chain of activity-action-operation.

This study contributes to the literature on theorizing engagement among people, technology and sociocultural environments through the theoretical lens of affordances and sheds new light on the challenges of information practice.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how game framing and task framing influence experienced meaningfulness (eudaimonia) and perceived enjoyment (hedonia), which, in turn, can account for user participation behavior in citizen science projects.

The authors designed and implemented a citizen science system, Citizen Sort, and used a survey method to investigate to what extent game framing and task framing influence participation behavior. PLS–SEM was used to test research hypotheses with 76 Citizen Sort participants.

Analysis confirmed that game framing and task framing have a significant impact on perceived enjoyment, but showed that only task framing has a direct effect on experienced meaningfulness. The effects of experienced meaningfulness on participation were fully mediated by perceived enjoyment. Content analysis of qualitative data revealed additional insights.

This research is limited due to its sample size and considered as an exploratory study, in which PLS–SEM was used to identify the impact of game framing and task framing as well as support the theory development regarding the dual nature of citizen science games.

This research provided suggestions for scientists, designers and project initiators that game framing and task framing should be effectively integrated to provide enjoyable and meaningful experiences so as to promote user contribution.

This research is one of initial studies which explored the impact of dual nature of citizen science games. The findings of this study provide the groundwork for guidelines and strategies to facilitate user contribution in citizen science projects.

Drawing upon the theory of planned behavior (TPB) and the self-regulation framework, the purpose of this paper is to investigate whether and how factors for social media continuance behaviors work differently between social networking sites and microblogging.

A survey method was used to collect two samples of 557 social networking sites users and 568 microblogging users. The proposed research model was tested with the structural equation modeling technique.

The empirical results demonstrate that the impacts of influencing factors on users’ continuance behaviors vary by types of social media services. Information sharing has a stronger impact on microblog users’ satisfaction than social network users while social interaction has a stronger impact on satisfaction for social network users than microblog users. In addition, interpersonal influence is more effective in shaping satisfaction for the social network users while media influence is more effective in shaping satisfaction for the microblog users.

This is one of the first studies that integrate TPB with Bagozzi’s self-regulation framework to understand the behavioral model of social networking and microblogging continuance. The findings show that the impacts of attitudinal beliefs regarding information sharing and social interaction on social media users’ satisfaction are different across social networking and microblogging contexts. Moreover, this study also reveals different effects of two specific subjective norms – interpersonal and media influence – on continued use of social networking and microblogging.

Drawing upon the motivational affordance theory, this paper aims to investigate how gamification design and human motivational needs are associated in extant literature.

The authors conducted a literature analysis of 60 journal articles that studied motivational influences of gamification in information technology design. Content analysis was used to identify game design features and motivation variables studied in prior literature, and correspondence analysis was used to show the co-occurrence of game design features and basic motivational needs.

The results showed that four types of game design features and eight basic motivational needs are studied in this pool of literature. Correspondence analysis indicates some interesting associations between game design features and basic human needs.

This research used a motivational affordance perspective to interpret the impact of game design features and suggested directions for future investigations. It is limited due to its sample size and considered as an exploratory study.

This research provided suggestions for technology designers that game design features vary in their motivational influence, and therefore, game design features should be used accordingly to meet users’ motivational needs.

This research is one of initial studies which explored the association between game design features and basic motivational needs. The findings of this study provide the groundwork for guidelines and strategies to facilitate motivational design in information technology.

The purpose of this paper is to study the participation behaviors in the context of crowdsourcing projects from the perspective of gamification.

This paper first proposed a model to depict the effect of four categories of game elements on three types of motivation based upon several motivation theories, which may, in turn, influence user participation. Then, 5 × 2 between-subject Web experiments were designed for collecting data and validating this model.

Game elements which provide participants with rewards and recognitions or remind participants of the completion progress of their tasks may positively influence the extrinsic motivation, whereas game elements which can help create a fantasy scene may strengthen intrinsic motivation. Besides, recognition-kind and progress-kind game elements may trigger the internalization of extrinsic motivation. In addition, when a task is of high complexity, the effects from game elements on extrinsic motivation and intrinsic motivation will be less prominent, whereas the internalization of extrinsic motivation may benefit from the increase of task complexity.

This study may uncover the motivation mechanism of several different kinds of game elements, which may help to find which game elements are more effective in enhancing engagement and participation in crowdsourcing projects. Besides, as task complexity is used as a moderator, one may be able to identify whether task complexity is able to influence the effects from game elements on motivations. Last, but not the least, this study will indicate the interrelationship between game elements, individual motivation and user participation, which can be adapted by other scholars.

Modeling and analysis of dimensional variation propagation is a crucial support technology for variation reduction, product/process design evaluation and recognition of variation source. However, owing to the multi-deviation (i.e. part deviations and fixture deviations) and multi-interaction (i.e. part-to-part interaction, part-to-fixture interaction and station-to-station interaction) in assembly processes, it is difficult for designers to describe or understand the variation propagation (or accumulation) mechanism clearly. The purpose of this paper is to propose a variation propagation modeling and analysis (VPMA) method based on multiple constraints aiming at a single station.

Initially, part-to-part constraints (PPCs) and part-to-fixture constraints (PFCs) are applied for the multi-interaction of assembly, and multiple constraints graph (MCG) model is proposed for expressing PPCs, PFCs, parts, as well as the variation propagation relation among them. Then, locating points (LPs) are adopted for representing the deviations in constraints, and formulas for calculating the deviations of LPs are derived. On that basis, a linearized relation between LPs’ deviations and part’s locating deviations is derived. Finally, a wing box is presented to validate the proposed method, and the results indicate the methodology’s feasibility.

MCG is an effective tool for dimensional VPMA, which is shown as an example of this paper.

Functions of geometric constraints in dimensional variation propagation are revealed, and MCG is proposed to formulize dimensional variation propagation.

The purpose of this paper is to study free L‐fuzzy left R‐module, using the language of categories and functors for the general description of L‐fuzzy left R‐modules generated by L‐fuzzy set. In the language of categories and functors, an L‐fuzzy left R‐modules generated by L‐fuzzy set is called a free object in the category of L‐fuzzy left R‐modules determined by L‐fuzzy set.

Category theory is used to study the existent quality, unique quality and material structure of L‐fuzzy left R‐modules generated by L‐fuzzy set.

The paper gives the uniqueness, structure and existence theorems of free object in the category of L‐fuzzy left R‐modules determined by L‐fuzzy set, and the authors prove that the fuzzy free functor is left adjoint to the fuzzy underlying functor.

Some property of free L‐fuzzy left R‐modules will need to be further researched.

The paper defines a new class of L‐fuzzy left R‐modules, i.e. free L‐fuzzy left R‐modules, research and explore free L‐fuzzy left R‐modules in theory.

The purpose of this paper is to present a method to calculate the transient induced voltages along the underground pipelines and analyze the transient interference generated in the pipelines due to the inductive coupling in the fault‐to‐ground condition of power lines in close proximity.

Based on finite difference‐time domain method, an improved method is proposed to calculate transient inductive interference in underground metallic pipelines due to a fault in nearby power lines. The frequency‐dependent problem in the analysis of transient interference is solved in phase domain. Compared with the traditional method, the disposal of phase‐modal transformation matrices’ frequency‐dependent characteristic is avoided and the calculation is simplified by using vector fitting approach and recursive algorithm greatly in the proposed method.

A novel improved method is proposed to calculate transient induced voltage distribution along underground metallic pipelines due to a fault in nearby power lines. Results show that the peak value of transient induced voltage at the most critical point is about 1.15 times of the magnitude in the steady state without the fault removed and the analysis of transient inductive interference is necessary in the fault‐to‐ground case of power lines.

In order to mitigate the interference from power lines to nearby pipelines, pipelines should be good grounded and positioned as far away from the power line as possible. In high soil resistivity areas, the common corridor should be avoided.

The paper presents a method to calculate the transient induced voltages along the underground pipelines and analyze the transient interference generated in the pipelines due to the inductive coupling in the fault‐to‐ground condition of nearby power lines. The proposed method is general and can also be applied to other transient interference studies such as crosstalk problems of communication networks and interference between power lines and aboveground pipelines or communication cables. Effects of various parameters upon the inductive interference generated in underground pipelines due to a fault in nearby power lines are analyzed to be a guide for controlling the inductive interference.

The purpose of this paper is to theoretically develop the concept of perceived affordance based on the existing studies, and to construct a conceptual framework to show how perceived affordances can facilitate the interaction design of social media.

The paper provides a review of the relevant literature on affordance and perceived affordance, and conceptually proposes a typology of perceived affordances in social media and an integrative framework for interaction design from sociomateriality perspective. Furthermore, a brief empirical example on the interaction design of crowdsourcing systems is used to ground and illustrate the authors' conceptual framework.

The paper shows that the perceived affordances may have multi‐facet characteristics and the interaction design of social media should reflect the multi‐dimensional perceived affordances. The perceived affordances can support or facilitate the design of basic elements of social media, such as content and form, to enhance both usability (human‐computer interaction) and sociability (human‐human interaction). A position of constitutive entanglement does not privilege either users or social media artifacts, nor does it provide a rigid triangle among these three components. Instead, the perceived affordances play a critical role in integrating the key components in social media interaction design as an ensemble.

The paper attempts to explore and develop the concept of perceived affordance and employ it as a theoretical lens to underpin interaction design of social media. Overall, the authors' study contributes to the design science literature in the information management field by elaborating a new theoretical perspective and providing a conceptual framework for the researchers and designers.

The essence of “Chinese element” has been pinpointed as the representation of national cultural archetype resource of China, which reflects to the overall power enhancement of China. Applying the Chinese national cultural archetype resource, which will be used for promoting the Chinese Brand internationalization, aims for the consumers' approval with the hope of integrating and spreading the unique cultural advantage of Chinese brand. The recognizing of Chinese brand's cultural archetype in this paper has constituted the basis of Chinese brand's cultural archetype strategy.

Based on the Grounded Theory, this paper has collected and analyzed the value symbols, character images and theme stories of Chinese narrative advertisements and constructed the cultural archetype framework of Chinese brands. This paper makes a comprehensive application of Charmaz's constructivist analysis and the main axis analysis and inspection method advocated by Strauss, with the aim of building a more objective and systematic theoretical framework for the Chinese brand cultural archetype.

In this framework, it revealed: (1) Chinese brand's cultural archetype can be divided into 12 concrete archetypes according to individual's relationship with self, the other, community and nature; (2) Consumers' different ways of self-categorization are attributed as the essential difference among various archetypes. This paper also compared and analyzed the differences between Chinese and Western cultural archetypes from three perspectives, formation of social structure, pedigree of myth and character's feature.

This paper has certain innovative significance to the theoretical construction of the archetype of Chinese brand culture. First, based on the cultural perspective, this paper applied the cultural psychological connotation of archetype to the brand research across culture, which is more conducive to the researchers' investigation of the cultural psychology of consumers in the cross-cultural context? Second, based on the identification and comparative study of Chinese brand culture archetype, it provides a new expansion and supplement for the research on brand internationalization and globalization in emerging countries.