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User acceptance is a necessary precondition to implementing self-driving buses as a solution to public transport challenges. Focusing on potential users in a real-life setting, this paper aims to analyze the factors that affect their willingness to use public autonomous shuttles (PASs) as well as their word-of-mouth (WOM) intentions.

Grounded on Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT2), the study was carried out on a sample of 318 potential users in a real-life setting. The hypothesized relationships were tested using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).

The study reveals that performance expectancy, facilitating conditions, hedonic motivation and trust are significant predictors of PAS usage intention, which is, in turn, related to WOM communication. Additionally, the factors that impact the intention to use a PAS are found to exert an indirect effect on WOM, mediated by usage intention.

This study includes practical insights for transport decision-makers on PAS service design, marketing campaigns and WOM monitoring.

While extant research focuses on passengers who have tried autonomous shuttles in experimental settings, this article adopts the perspective of potential users who have no previous experience with these vehicles and identifies the link between usage intention and WOM communication in a real-life traffic environment.

若要引入自動駕駛巴士來解決公共交通的問題和挑戰,一個必不可少的先決條件是得到用戶的認可。本研究透過重點分析活在真實生活環境中的潛在用戶,來探討影響他們使用公共自動交通工具的意願和口碑動機的各個因素。

本研究以延伸整合型科技接受模式為基礎,對一個涵蓋處身於真實生活環境中318名潛在用戶的樣本進行分析和探討。研究人員以偏最小平方法的結構方程模型 (PLS-SEM), 去測試各個被假設的關聯。

研究結果顯示,績效期望、有利條件、享樂動機和信任均明顯能夠預測人們使用公共自動交通工具的意願,而人們使用公共自動交通工具的意願又反過來與口碑溝通有所相關。另外,研究人員發現,影響人們使用公共自動交通工具意願的各個因素,對口碑會產生間接的影響,而使用意願是會起著調節作用的。

現存的學術研究均聚焦分析那些曾於實驗設置下坐過自動交通工具的人士,而本研究卻採用從未坐過自動交通工具人士的角度來進行分析與探討,並且找出了於實際的交通環境裡、使用意願與口碑溝通之間的關聯。

本研究提供的啟示,對有關公共自動交通工具服務設計、市場營銷活動和口碑監督工作的運輸決策者來說頗具實務意義。

With Industry 4.0 and the extensive rise of smart technologies, we are seeing remarkable transformations in work practices and workplaces. Scholars report the phenomenal progress of smart technologies. At the same time, we can hear the rhetoric emphasising their potential threats. This study focusses on how and where intelligent machines are leveraged in the workplace, how humans co-working with intelligent machines are affected and what they believe can be done to mitigate the risks of the increased use of intelligent machines.

We conducted in-depth interviews with 15 respondents working in various leadership capacities associated with intelligent machines and technologies. Using NVivo, we coded and churned out the themes from the qualitative data collected.

This study shows how intelligent machines are leveraged across different industries, ranging from chatbots, intelligent sensors, cognitive systems and computer vision to the replica of the entire human being. They are used end-to-end in the value chain, increasing productivity, complementing human workers’ skillsets and augmenting decisions made by human workers. Human workers experience a blend of positive and negative emotions whilst co-working with intelligent machines, which influences their job satisfaction level. Organisations adopt several anticipatory strategies, like transforming into a learning organisation, identifying futuristic technologies and upskilling their human workers, regularly conducting social learning events and designing accelerated career paths to embrace intelligent technologies.

This study seeks to understand the emotional and practical implications of the use of intelligent machines by humans and how both entities can integrate and complement each other. These insights can help organisations and employees understand what future workplaces and practices will look like and how to remain relevant in this transformation.

Children suffering from cancer or cardiovascular disease, who need extended periods of treatment in hospitals, are subjected to multiple hardships apart from the physical implications, for example, experienced isolation and disrupted social and academic development. This has negative effects long after the child's recovery from the illness. The purpose of this paper is to examine the non-medical needs of children suffering from a long-term illness, as well as research the field of artificial intelligence (AI) – more specifically, the use of socially intelligent agents (SIAs) – in order to study how technology can enhance children's interaction, participation and quality of life.

Interviews were performed with experts in three fields: housing manager for hospitalized children, a professor in computing science and researcher in AI, and an engineer and developer at a tech company.

It is important for children to be able to take control of the narrative by using an SIA to support the documentation of their period of illness, for example. This could serve as a way of processing emotions, documenting educational development or keeping a reference for later in life. The findings also show that the societal benefits of AI include automating mundane tasks and recognizing patterns.

The originality of this study concerns the holistic approach of increasing the knowledge and understanding of these children's specific needs and challenges, particularly regarding their participation and interaction with teachers and friends at school, using an SIA.

In recent years, railway systems worldwide have faced challenges such as the modernization of engineering projects, efficient management of intelligent digital railway equipment, rapid growth in passenger and freight transport demands, customized transport services and ubiquitous transport safety. The transformation toward intelligent digital transformation in railways has emerged as an effective response to the formidable challenges confronting the railway industry, thereby becoming an inevitable global trend in railway development.

This paper, therefore, conducts a comprehensive analysis of the current state of global railway intelligent digital transformation, focusing on the characteristics and applications of intelligent digital transformation technology. It summarizes and analyzes relevant technologies and applicable scenarios in the realm of railway intelligent digital transformation, theoretically elucidating the development process of global railway intelligent digital transformation and, in practice, providing guidance and empirical examples for railway intelligence and digital transformation.

Digital and intelligent technologies follow a wave-like pattern of continuous iterative evolution, progressing from the early stages, to a period of increasing attention and popularity, then to a phase of declining interest, followed by a resurgence and ultimately reaching a mature stage.

The results offer reference and guidance to fully leverage the opportunities presented by the latest wave of the digitalization revolution, accelerate the overall upgrade of the railway industry and promote global collaborative development in railway intelligent digital transformation.

Skilled migrants' careers are heterogeneous, with existing theories capturing only some of their diversity and dynamic development over time and circumstance. This paper aims to draw out the multilevel (macro, meso and micro levels) influences impacting skilled migrants' careers by using the lens of the intelligent career framework. Furthermore, structuration theory captures the agency of skilled migrants facing different social structures at and across levels and explains the idiosyncratic nature of skilled migrants' careers.

Following an abductive approach, this paper examines the career influences for a sample of 41 skilled migrants in three different host countries. Individual career stories were collected through qualitative interviews. Important career influences from these narratives are categorised across the intelligent career competencies (knowing why, how and whom) at the macro, meso and micro levels.

Findings illustrate the lived reality for skilled migrants of these interrelated multilevel career influences and go some way in elucidating the heterogeneity of skilled migrants' careers and outcomes. The interplay of individual agency in responding to both facilitating and challenging social structures across the multilevels further explains the idiosyncratic nature of skilled migrants' careers and how/whether they achieve satisfying career outcomes. Some potential policy implications and options arising from these findings are suggested.

By considering multilevel themes that influence skilled migrants' career capital, the authors were able to better explain the complex, relational and idiosyncratic shaping of their individual careers. As such, the framework informs and guides individuals, practitioners and organisations seeking to facilitate skilled migrants' careers.

Preservice teacher (PST) professional development programs are crucial for cultivating high-quality STEAM teachers of the future, significantly impacting the quality of regional STEAM education. The Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, as a region of cross-border cooperation, integrates the resources and advantages of Guangdong, Hong Kong, and Macao, possessing rich cultural heritage and innovative capabilities. Transdisciplinary Education for Cultural Inheritance (C-STEAM) is an effective approach to promoting educational collaboration within the Greater Bay Area, facilitating the integration of both technological and humanities education. This study aims to develop a Technology-Enabled University-School-Enterprise (T-USE) collaborative education model and implement it in the Greater Bay Area, to explore its role as a support mechanism in professional development and its impact on C-STEAM PSTs' professional capital.

Adopting a qualitative methodology, the study interviewed PSTs who participated in a C-STEAM teacher education course under the T-USE model. Thematic coding is used to analyze their knowledge acquisition, interaction benefits with community members, and autonomous thinking and decision-making in theoretical learning and teaching practice.

The findings show that the T-USE model significantly enhanced the PSTs' human capital, including teaching beliefs, knowledge, and skills. In terms of social capital, PSTs benefited from collaboration with PST groups, university teaching teams, in-service teachers, and enterprises, though challenges such as varying levels of expertise among in-service teachers and occasional technical instability emerged. For decisional capital, the T-USE model provided opportunities for autonomous thinking and promoted teaching judgment skills through real teaching challenges and scenarios. Reflective practice activities also supported PSTs' professional growth.

This study reveals the effectiveness and internal mechanism of the T-USE model in C-STEAM PST training, offering significant theoretical and practical references for future PST education.

This micro-level study unpacks the recruitment and retention of international professionals to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The study highlights the influence of the founders' international experience when applying organisational-level (meso) policies and practices. With their insider experience as skilled migrants, we share how the founders in each of the SMEs mobilised career capital into human resource management (HRM) strategies.

Combining literature on SMEs and skilled migrants' careers, we draw upon intelligent career theory to illuminate the recruitment and retention of self-initiated expatriates and skilled migrants in SMEs. With three SME case studies as samples–one micro, one small and one medium-sized organisation in Ireland–we consider the influence of the founders' international experience in the design and application of formal and informal HRM strategies (at the organisational level) that are operationalised to recruit and retain international talent to/in these organisations.

The HRM practices in the three SME cases in this paper, each run by migrant founders, vary from formalised (for our medium-sized organisation), semi-formalised (for our small-sized organisation) to ad hoc and tailor-made (for our micro-sized organisation). These particular SMEs were often more receptive to hiring other migrants. The important role of the three SME case studies' skilled migrant founders and their own international career experiences was apparent in the particular HRM approaches they adopted. The relevance of intelligent career theory when applying micro-level findings at the meso-organisational level is shown.

The paper presents how the international experience of founder–managers, in turn, impacts on the HRM practices and policies that are implemented to recruit and retain international employees. The study highlights how both organisation size and founder-manager international experience influence the degree of customisation of HRM practices and policies in SMEs, specifically pertaining to the recruitment and retention of self-initiated expatriates and skilled migrant employees. The heterogeneity within the sub-categories encompassed under the umbrella label of SME is emphasised; validating our case study approach, where nuance and detail of the specific organisation can be shared.

To promote the cultural communication and art appreciation of Inscriptions and calligraphy which are important cultural heritages in China, with a broad crowd base and educational appreciation value, by using digital humanities methods and technologies, the paper aims to discuss how to develop a new user-oriented knowledge base according to user needs for inscription rubbings research and appreciation.

The paper investigates user needs and current problems on the basis of status quo and summation of extensive service experience; validates the rationality of requirements and user scenarios with user research methods including focus groups, interviews and behavior observations; then designs and develops the technical solution of data process, knowledge base construction and service platform through experimental research methods based on agile project management.

The paper proposes a new reading mode for browsing and appreciation inscription rubbing works, a diverse knowledge-integrated knowledge organizational structure, a systematic user experience and service guiding framework which can be widely applicable to the development of other cultural heritage knowledge bases. Apart from that, the paper puts forward intelligent service development goals for the future.

The paper proposes a new reading mode with the overall functions and user experience design and development for browsing and appreciation inscription rubbing works, a diverse knowledge-integrated knowledge organizational structure, a systematic user experience and service guiding framework which can be widely applicable to the development of other cultural heritage knowledge bases. Apart from that, the paper puts forward intelligent service development goals for the future.

This study focuses on memorable customer shopping experience design in the sporting goods retail setting. It aims to identify the phygital customers' needs and expectations that are satisfied through in-store technologies and to detect the in-store strategies that use these technologies to make the store attractive and experiential.

This exploratory study adopted a qualitative research methodology, specifically a multiple-case study, by performing semi-structured interviews with sporting goods store managers.

Sporting goods retailers use various in-store technologies to create a phygital customer shopping experience, including devices, mobile apps, wireless communication technologies, in-store activations, support devices, intelligent stations, and sensors. To improve the phygital customer journey and the phygital shopping experience, retailers meet customers' needs for utilitarian, hedonic, social, and playfulness experiences. Purely physical or digital strategies, as well as phygital strategies, are identified. This research also proposes a model of in-store phygital customer shopping experience design for sporting goods retailers.

Sporting goods managers can invest in multiple technologies by designing a physical environment according to the customers' needs for utilitarian, hedonic, social, and playful experiences. In addition, they can improve the phygital customer shopping experience with specific push strategies that increase customer engagement and, in turn, brand and store loyalty.

This study highlights how the phygital customer experiential journey can be created through new technologies and improved with specific reference to the sporting goods stores.