Search results
1 – 10 of over 7000Samuel Gyimah, De-Graft Owusu-Manu, David J. Edwards, Joseph Ignatius Teye Buertey and Anthony Kwame Danso
In recent times, both academics and industrialists have undertaken research into various areas of circular business models (CBM) in a bid to promote a green economy. Yet despite…
Abstract
Purpose
In recent times, both academics and industrialists have undertaken research into various areas of circular business models (CBM) in a bid to promote a green economy. Yet despite numerous studies conducted, the ensuing discourse contains scant information regarding the contributions of CBM towards the transition of green economy in the construction industry. This present study therefore aims to explore the contributions of CBM in the transition towards a green economy in the Ghanaian construction industry.
Design/methodology/approach
A comprehensive literature review was first conducted to identify the contributions of CBM towards the transition towards a green economy. A quantitative research strategy was then adopted to collect primary questionnaire data from professionals with knowledge of CBM and the green economy from 104 participants for the study. The data gathered was analyzed using descriptive statistics and exploratory factor analysis viz. Principal component analysis.
Findings
The contributions of CBM towards the transition towards a green economy were found to be: value contributions (i.e. lower carbon footprint, lower emission of waste by the industry, value creation for clients, innovation in construction materials and methods, reduced maintenance cost, creation of energy efficient infrastructures, improved value proposition for firms, improved sustainability of the industry and reduced pressure on finite resource.); green contributions (i.e. recycling and reuse of construction waste, promotion of green building technology, increased potential for economic growth, increased resource efficiency and creation of green building market) and longevity contribution (i.e. increased life span of buildings). It was evident that CBM make significant contributions in the transition towards green economy and as such, policymakers and other stakeholders within the construction industry must adopt these models to maximize their green credentials and accrue inherent benefits associated with transitioning towards a green economy.
Originality/value
This paper presents a novel and comprehensive study that explores the contributions of CBM towards engendering a green economy. The study’s results provide construction industry stakeholders and policymakers with clear insight into the contributions of CBM towards the transition into a green economy. In practice, this study provides much needed guidance to support construction practitioners to transition towards a green economy in alignment with the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Details
Keywords
The aim of this paper is to generate a streamlined, transparent and effective instrument to fairly measure the contribution made by each student to a group project within a higher…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this paper is to generate a streamlined, transparent and effective instrument to fairly measure the contribution made by each student to a group project within a higher education context. The primary aim is to moderate the grades of underperforming students at the end of the project. There is a secondary benefit in alerting underperforming students to raise their contribution mid-task or face a potentially reduced grade at the final stage.
Design/methodology/approach
The development of this multi-dimensional instrument is guided by findings from previous research. The quest is to minimise the instructor's administrative work load in applying a moderation-only instrument that is open-source and available at no cost. Based on the literature, the survey instrument seeks to apply a peer-based, equitable and transparent evaluation of each member's contribution to a group task. The survey is applied at mid-task and again at end-task in order to afford underperformers the opportunity to address contribution deficits during the final phase of the project.
Findings
The instrument, called TANDEM©, offers a transparent, streamlined, equitable, confidential and practical measure of each student's contribution to a graded group task. Students whose end-task contribution falls below the group average rating receive a proportional reduction in their personal grade. Additionally, the end-task moderation instrument captures a single-item holistic measure of relative contribution that may, in the future, serve as a surrogate for the multi-dimensional measures currently in place.
Research limitations/implications
TANDEM© was developed with group sizes of four or five members in mind. There is no evidence to support its application to three-person groups. Moreover, the application was applied only amongst under-graduate students. It is yet to be applied across post-graduate groups and within online learning environments. Future research into diverse cultural settings would serve to advance understanding of how moderation is perceived across borders.
Practical implications
Several existing group grade moderation methods propose complex algorithms that are “black box” solutions from a student's perspective. In establishing a fair, streamlined, confidential and transparent process for peer-rated moderation, TANDEM© deploys a concise instrument with a relatively small administrative load. TANDEM © may be applied to all groups or can selectively be applied to groups that report moderate, strong or extreme levels of conflict.
Social implications
Students will appreciate the opportunity to rate peer contributions to group projects. This will dissipate the negative social sentiment that may arise when fellow students benefit from the work of others. Those students seeking conflict resolution within the group will value the transparent and equitable moderation of grades as well as the positive social implications that follow.
Originality/value
This research forms part of an ongoing quest to present a moderation instrument that fairly identifies student contribution to a group project. Whilst the solution proposed is one of many existing alternatives, its focus is on a practical moderation-only instrument that can immediately be applied to a course or major. The benefits lie in the ease of application and minimal administrative workload. This constitutes an original contribution to the individual (course or major) coordinator who seeks to apply a moderation-only instrument without having to commit to an extensive, broad-based group optimisation programme.
Details
Keywords
Olga Blasco-Blasco, Márton Demeter and Manuel Goyanes
The purpose of this article is to theoretically outline and empirically test two contribution-based indicators: (1) the scholars' annual contribution-based measurement and (2…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this article is to theoretically outline and empirically test two contribution-based indicators: (1) the scholars' annual contribution-based measurement and (2) the annual contribution modified h-index, computing six criteria: total number of papers, computed SCImago Journal Rank values, total number of authors, total number of citations of a scholar’s work, number of years since paper publication and number of annual paper citations.
Design/methodology/approach
Despite widespread scholarly agreement about the relevance of research production in evaluation and recruitment processes, the proposed mechanisms for gauging publication output are still rather elementary, consequently obscuring each individual scholar’s contributions. This study utilised the Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution method, and the authors built two indicators to value author's contribution.
Findings
To test both indicators, this study focussed on the most productive scholars in communication during a specific time period (2017–2020), ranking their annual research contribution and testing it against standard productivity measures (i.e. number of papers and h-index).
Originality/value
This article contributes to current scientometric studies by addressing some of the limitations of aggregate-level measurements of research production, providing a much-needed understanding of scholarly productivity based on scholars' actual contribution to research.
Details
Keywords
The online health community's success depends on doctors' active participation, so it is essential to understand the factors that affect doctors' knowledge contribution behavior…
Abstract
Purpose
The online health community's success depends on doctors' active participation, so it is essential to understand the factors that affect doctors' knowledge contribution behavior in the online health communities. From the perspective of peer effect, this paper discusses the influence of focal doctors' peers on focal doctors' knowledge contribution behavior and the mechanism behind it. This paper aims to solve these problems.
Design/methodology/approach
Empirical data of 1,938 doctors were collected from a Chinese online health community, and propensity score matching and ordinary least squares were employed to verify the proposed theoretical model.
Findings
The results show that the presence of focal doctors' peers in online health communities has a positive effect on the knowledge contribution behavior of focal doctors, and the economic returns and social returns of focal doctors' peers have a significant mediating effect.
Originality/value
This paper discusses focal doctors' knowledge contribution behavior from the perspective of peer effect. It enhances the understanding of focal doctors' behavior in the online health communities by exploring the mediating role of their peers' economic and social returns. The results of this paper extend the research in the field of peer effect and online health and provide management implications and suggestions for online health platforms and doctors.
Details
Keywords
Lijuan Luo, Yuwei Wang, Siqi Duan, Shanshan Shang, Baojun Ma and Xiaoli Zhou
Based on the perspectives of social capital, image motivation and motivation affordances, this paper explores the direct and moderation effects of different kinds of motivations…
Abstract
Purpose
Based on the perspectives of social capital, image motivation and motivation affordances, this paper explores the direct and moderation effects of different kinds of motivations (i.e. relationship-based motivation, community-based motivation and individual-based motivation) on users' continuous knowledge contributions in social question and answer (Q&A) communities.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors collect the panel data of 10,193 users from a popular social Q&A community in China. Then, a negative binomial regression model is adopted to analyze the collected data.
Findings
The paper demonstrates that social learning, peer recognition and knowledge seeking positively affect users' continuous contribution behaviors. However, the results also show that social exposure has the opposite effect. In addition, self-presentation is found to moderate the influence of social factors on users' continuous use behaviors, while the moderation effect of motivation affordances has no significance.
Originality/value
First, this study develops a comprehensive motivation framework that helps gain deeper insights into the underlying mechanism of knowledge contribution in social Q&A communities. Second, this study conducts panel data analysis to capture the impacts of motivations over time, rather than intentions at a fixed time point. Third, the findings can help operators of social Q&A communities to optimize community norms and incentive mechanisms.
Details
Keywords
Liya Wang, Rong Cong, Shuxiang Wang, Sitan Li and Ya Wang
The research aims to explore the influence mechanism of peer feedback and users' knowledge contribution behavior. This study draws on the social identity theory and considers…
Abstract
Purpose
The research aims to explore the influence mechanism of peer feedback and users' knowledge contribution behavior. This study draws on the social identity theory and considers social identity as a mediating factor into the research framework.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper collected users' activity data of 142,191 ideas submitted by 76,647 users from the MIUI community between October 2010 and May 2018 via Python software, and data were processed using Stata 16.0.
Findings
The results indicate that knowledge feedback and social feedback positively influence users' knowledge contribution (quantity and quality), respectively. User's cognitive identity positively mediates the relationship between peer feedback and knowledge contribution behavior, affective identity positively mediates the relationship between peer feedback and knowledge contribution behavior, while evaluative identity positively mediates the relationship between peer feedback and knowledge contribution quality, but there is no mediating effect between peer feedback and knowledge contribution quantity.
Originality/value
This study advances knowledge management by highlighting peer feedback on online innovation communities. By demonstrating the significant mediating effect of social identity, this study empirically clarifies the relationships of peer feedback (knowledge feedback and social feedback) to specific dimensions of knowledge contribution, thereby providing managerial guidance to the online innovation community on incentivizing and managing user interaction to foster the innovation development of firms.
Details
Keywords
Chencheng Shi, Ping Hu, Weiguo Fan and Liangfei Qiu
Users' knowledge contribution behaviors are critical for online Q&A communities to thrive. Well-organized question threads in online Q&A communities enable users to clearly read…
Abstract
Purpose
Users' knowledge contribution behaviors are critical for online Q&A communities to thrive. Well-organized question threads in online Q&A communities enable users to clearly read existing answers and their evaluations before contributing. Based on the social comparison and peer influence literature, the authors examine peer influence on the informativeness of knowledge contributions in competitive settings. The authors also consider three levels of moderating factors concerning individuals' perception of competitiveness: question level, thread level and contributor level.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors collected data from one of the largest online Q&A communities in China. The hypotheses were validated using hierarchical linear models with cross-classified random effects. The generalized propensity score weighting method was employed for the robustness check.
Findings
The authors demonstrate the peer influence due to social comparison concerns among knowledge contribution behaviors in the same question thread. If more prior knowledge contributors choose to contribute long answers in the question thread, the subsequent contributions are more informative. This peer influence is stronger for factual questions and questions with higher popularity of answering but weaker in recommendation-type and well-answered questions and for contributors with higher social status.
Originality/value
This research provides a new cue of peer influence on online UGC contributions in competitive settings initiated by social comparison concerns. Additionally, the authors identify three levels of moderating factors (question level, thread level and contributor level) that are specific to online Q&A settings and are related to a contributor's perception of competitiveness, which affect the direct effect of peer influence on knowledge contributions. Rather than focus on motivation and quality evaluation, the authors concentrate on the specific content of online knowledge contributions. Peer influence here is not based on an actual acquaintance or a following relationship but on answering the same question. The authors also illustrate the competitive peer influence in subjective and personalized behaviors in online UGC communities.
Details
Keywords
Mohammad AlMarzouq, Varun Grover, Jason Thatcher and Rich Klein
To remain sustainable, open source software (OSS) projects must attract new members—or newcomers—who make contributions. In this paper, the authors develop a set of hypotheses…
Abstract
Purpose
To remain sustainable, open source software (OSS) projects must attract new members—or newcomers—who make contributions. In this paper, the authors develop a set of hypotheses based on the knowledge barriers framework that examines how OSS communities can encourage contributions from newcomers.
Design/methodology/approach
Employing longitudinal data from the source code repositories of 232 OSS projects over a two-year period, the authors employ a Poisson-based mixed model to test how community characteristics, such as the main drivers of knowledge-based costs, relate to newcomers' contributions.
Findings
The results indicate that community characteristics, such as programming language choice, documentation effort and code structure instability, are the main drivers of knowledge-based contribution costs. The findings also suggest that managing these costs can result in more inclusive OSS communities, as evidenced by the number of contributing newcomers; the authors highlight the importance of maintaining documentation efforts for OSS communities.
Originality/value
This paper assumes that motivational factors are a necessary but insufficient condition for newcomer participation in OSS projects and that the cost to participation should be considered. Using the knowledge barriers framework, this paper identifies the main knowledge-based costs that hinder newcomer participation. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first empirical study that does not limit data collection to a single hosting platform (e.g., SourceForge), which improves the generalizability of the findings.
Details
Keywords
Cari Burke-Kolehmainen and Melissa Intindola
Within the context of the nonprofit resiliency framework, the authors use nonprofit functional expenses and contribution revenue to explore how the COVID-19 pandemic affected the…
Abstract
Purpose
Within the context of the nonprofit resiliency framework, the authors use nonprofit functional expenses and contribution revenue to explore how the COVID-19 pandemic affected the ability of nonprofits in different subsectors to carry out their mission, as well as their ability to “pivot” fundraising strategies to integrate social media and digital engagement.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors use IRS form 990 return data for organizations with a year-end return that includes at least six months of COVID-19 impact (“Wave 1 Effects” period) and also have a prior-year return (“Business as Usual” period). The authors use Wilcoxon signed rank tests to examine whether there are differences in our variables of interest between the two periods.
Findings
While the majority of nonprofits in most subsectors experienced a significant decrease in program spending, fundraising spending and fundraising efficiency ratios between the two time periods, the authors found variation in the change in contribution revenue and fundraising ratio between the two periods between subsectors. The authors also find that the percentage of nonprofits able to “pivot” their fundraising strategies varies by subsector between 13.33 and 31.23%.
Originality/value
This paper provides new information regarding the pandemic's initial effect on nonprofit program and fundraising spending, the related contribution revenue and the ability of nonprofits to “pivot” fundraising to remote strategies. The authors propose a more robust fundraising efficiency measure and a new measure indicating a nonprofit's “ability to pivot” their fundraising strategy. The authors encourage future researchers to conduct further longitudinal studies to understand how these effects may continue or change.
Details
Keywords
Junping Qiu, Qinze Mi, Zhongyang Xu, Tingyong Zhang and Tao Zhou
Based on the social interaction theory and trust theory, this study investigates the switching of users on social question and answer (Q&A) platforms from knowledge seekers to…
Abstract
Purpose
Based on the social interaction theory and trust theory, this study investigates the switching of users on social question and answer (Q&A) platforms from knowledge seekers to knowledge contributors.
Design/methodology/approach
We used Python to gather data from Zhihu, performed hypothesis testing on the models using Poisson regression and finally conducted a mediation effect analysis.
Findings
The findings reveal that knowledge seeking impacts users' motivation for information interaction, emotional interaction and trust. Notably, information interaction and trust exhibit a chained mediation effect that subsequently influences knowledge contribution.
Originality/value
Current studies on user knowledge behavior typically examine individual actions, rarely connecting knowledge seeking and knowledge contribution. However, the balance of knowledge inflow and outflow is crucial for social Q&A platforms. To cover this gap, this paper empirically investigates the switching between knowledge seeking and knowledge contribution based on the social interaction theory and trust theory.
Details