Short-Term Study Abroad Research: A Systematic Review 2000-2019

Short-term study abroad (STSA) programs are the fastest growing segment of experiential learning programs in management education and the least studied. This is the first systematic review of STSA research, which focuses on 156 studies on STSA published between 2000 and 2019 and proposes a conceptual model to guide STSA research scholars. Through this detailed review, we provide a greater understanding of the scale, scope, key themes, and methodology of STSA research. Our article identifies the four key groups of theories used to inform STSA research, and provides insight into the variables and characteristics of STSA research, and the role of STSA in management education. Our review identifies 85 thematic outcomes found in the STSA literature and gives a particular focus to the 29 cross-cultural outcomes that characterize this literature. The review provides the first systematic analysis of cross-cultural outcomes within STSA research and identifies behavioral attributes as among the most studied. Cultural and learning theories were found to be the dominant theories that informed the underlying concepts in the STSA literature. Our review also provides a comprehensive agenda and directions for future STSA research, discussion on its impact, and its place in management education.

THE EFFECT OF TECHNOLOGICAL AND BEHAVIORAL ON THE ADOPTION OF THE SHOPEEPAY MOBILE PAYMENT

This study aims to examine the effect of technological and behavioral attributes on the adoption attributes of the ShopeePay mobile payment application in Indonesia. The application is known as financial technology (fintech), which combines information technology and financial systems. The approach used in this research is a quantitative approach that was processed using SPSS and AMOS. Data collection in this research was done by distributing online questionnaires using a google form to ShopeePay users who used the application in the past month. The results of this study indicate that behavioral intention and social influence variables have an effect on actual use, perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use have an effect on behavioral intention, perceived ease of use and responsiveness have a positive effect on perceived usefulness, and responsiveness and security variables have a positive effect on perceived ease of use, also has a positive effect on social influence.

Users’ response toward online doctor consultation platforms: SOR approach

PurposeThis study aims to investigate the external and internal stimuli, which affect the organismic experiences of the users and thereby influence their response in terms of behavioral intention toward the use of online doctor consultation platforms.Design/methodology/approachThe study operationalized the stimulus–organism–response framework for the research model and surveyed 357 users in India who had experienced online doctor consultation platforms. The analysis has been done using the structural equation modeling approach.FindingsThe authors’ main results indicate the following key points. One, perceived usefulness, social influence, health anxiety, offline consultation habit and perceived technology usage risk are significant predictors of perceived value. In contrast, perceived ubiquity is identified to be an insignificant predictor of perceived value. Second, social influence and perceived technology usage risk have significant influence on trust. However, perceived usefulness is not a significant predictor of trust.Research limitations/implicationsThis study contributes to the theory by integrating technology-oriented factors with behavioral attributes for determining the behavioral intention of users toward the online doctor consultation platforms.Practical implicationsThe managerial contributions of this study involve highlighting those technology-oriented and behavioral elements, which can be targeted to attract more users toward these platforms.Originality/valueThis is an original study that has looked beyond the role of technology-oriented factors in influencing the perceived value and trust elements while investigating the behavioral intention among the users toward the online doctor consultation platforms.

Unfreezing without Refreezing Change Management: Dilemmatic Roles of Agents in Succeeding the Bureaucracy Reform

The implementation of bureaucracy reform in many countries continues to experience various problems, in relation to the system, regulations and actors. The success of such reform shows the important role of the actors involved in promoting change agendas. Studies on bureaucracy reform have covered many aspects of the system, stages and factors that influence its success or failure. This study specifically analyses the aspect of the related actors, namely the role of change agents in the implementation of change management, who support the implementation of bureaucracy reform. Departing from theory regarding the role of agent of change and the stages of change management during the process of bureaucracy reform, the data collection was conducted through in-depth interviews with a number of stakeholders of National Development Planning Agency, Indonesia. The qualitative data is processed using the Discourse Network Analyzer. The results show that there are three roles conducted by the agent of change in pushing reform agendas, namely as catalysts, solution givers and as process helper. To improve the performance of their roles, there are at least two attributes that they must have, i.e., skills and behavioral attributes, which both play a significant role in supporting the success of bureaucracy reform.

Behavioral Biomarker Responses of Filopaludina bengalensis to Acute Copper Toxicity

As heavy metals are bioaccumulative and toxic in nature, increasing heavy metal levels in the environment is of great concern. The present study was aimed to assess the acute toxicity effects of copper on some behavioral attributes of Filopaludina bengalensis (locally known as ‘Genri’), a freshwater gastropod, under laboratory condition. Exposure to copper (0.50-2.0 ppm) for 96 h resulted in significant mortality. Recorded LC50 value at 96h was 0.586 ppm. The aggregation tendency, crawling activity and mucus secretion were observed at different exposure period upon acute exposure of copper (0.586 ppm).With the advancement of exposure period, gradual deaggregation was observed in snails of copper treated sets. There was statistically significant difference (P <0.01) in aggregation response and foot protrusion response at different span of exposure in copper treated groups. In copper treated sets, a substantial increase (P<0.01) in mucus secretion (%) was evident with time. Foot protrusion and movement was inhibited in copper treated groups. All three responses in the copper treated groups were significantly different (P <0.01) from that of control groups. The behavioral responses observed in this study of Filopaludina bengalensis could be used as biomarkers for copper contamination in any aquatic ecosystems.

Soundscape Perceptions and Preferences for Different Groups of Users in Urban Recreational Forest Parks

Although the soundscape in cities is receiving increased attention in urban planning, there is still a lack of knowledge of how personal factors influence the perception of and preference for soundscapes. Most present studies are linked to one or a few specific soundscapes and do not have a holistic approach exploring the pros and cons of all soundscapes in a place. This study surveyed individuals to assess how soundscape perceptions and preferences may differ among various attendees of typical urban forest recreational parks in Xi’an, China, using an on-site questionnaire. The respondents (N = 2034) revealed that rare natural sounds were perceived more positively than the dominating artificial sounds. Five main dimensions of social, demographic, and behavioral attributes were found to be linked to the soundscape perceptions and preferences: (1) familiarity of the park and attendees’ age made people more tolerant towards sounds that others find annoying; (2) higher education and higher socio-economic status showed lower tolerance towards sounds; (3) having companions and specific types of recreational use increased the frequent perception of artificial sounds; (4) females generally showed higher sensitivity and lower tolerance than males towards several sounds; and (5) the longer attendees remained in the park, the more positive the overall soundscape preference was. The results indicate that numerous sounds are affecting people’s overall experience in the parks. These findings could help decision-makers and urban forest recreational park designers to formulate relevant strategies for park design that are in tune with varying public needs and expectations towards soundscape. The implementation of human-oriented soundscape design can therefore enhance people’s well-being.

The Representations of Palestinians Behavioral Attributes in Hollywood Movies from 2000 to 2014

Since the period followed the September 11 in 2001 attack, and the second Palestinian uprising in 2000, Hollywood has produced many movies representing the Arab. The representation was shown in certain positions and scenes in the movie to give a certain meaning. Further, most of these previous studies have studied the personality in Hollywood movies combined with Arab characters. However, this study seeks to explore the behavioural attributes of the Palestinian character represented in Hollywood feature movies from the year 2000 to 2014 in detailed analysis. A literature analysis reviewed Arab representations in Hollywood movies. The quantitative approach is adopted as well as the data has been collected by employing the quantitative content analysis through using a coding sheet. The sample selection of this study is total population sampling. The unit analysis is 71 scenes that include and involve Palestinian character(s) within the five Hollywood feature movies. This study has approved that after the second Palestinian uprising in 2000 and September 2001 attack, the Palestinian behavioural attributes began to change. Thus, the behavioural attributes of The Palestinian character have represented in more complexity than the previous representation. Additionally, this study has observed that, after the September attack, Hollywood has modified the Palestinian behavioural representation. Keywords: Palestinian, stereotype, terrorism, Hollywood movies, Palestinian behavioural.

Prospect Theory for Human-Centric Communications

Entering the 5G/6G era, the core concept of human-centric communications has intensified the research effort into analytical frameworks for integrating technological and non-technological domains. Among non-technological domains, human behavioral, psychological, and socio-economic contexts are widely considered as indispensable elements for characterizing user experience (UE). In this study, we introduce the prospect theory as a promising methodology for modeling UE and perceptual measurements for human-centric communications. As the founding pillar of behavioral economics, the prospect theory proposes the non-linear quantity and probability perception of human psychology, which extends to five fundamental behavioral attributes that have profound implications for diverse disciplines. An example of applying the novel theoretic framework is also provided to illustrate how the prospect theory can be utilized to incorporate human factors and analyze human-centric communications. By expatiating on the prospect theoretic framework, we aim to provide a guideline for developing human-centric communications and articulate a novel interdisciplinary research area for further investigation.

Exploring the Effect of Collective Cultural Attributes on Covid-19-Related Public Health Outcomes

Infections and deaths associated with COVID-19 show a high degree of heterogeneity across different populations. A thorough understanding of population-level predictors of such outcomes is crucial for devising better-targeted and more appropriate public health preparedness measures. While demographic, economic, and health-system capacity have featured prominently in recent work, cultural, and behavioral characteristics have largely been overlooked. However, cultural differences shape both the public policy response and individuals' behavioral responses to the crisis in ways that can impact infection dynamics and key health outcomes. To address this gap, we used meta-analytic methods to explore the global variability of three public health outcomes (i.e., crude test positivity, case/infection fatality, and mortality risk) during the first wave of the pandemic. This set of analyses identified several cultural/behavioral attributes (e.g., uncertainty avoidance and long-term vs. short-term normative orientation) as independent predictors of public health outcomes after adjusting for key demographic, political, economic, and health-system-related predictors; which were robust in sensitivity analyses. In conclusion, this study clearly demonstrates that cultural attributes do in fact account for some of the global disparities in COVID-19-attributed health outcomes. As a consequence, policymakers should more explicitly consider a society's cultural attributes alongside other important parameters such as demographic characteristics and health system constraints in order to develop better tailored and more effective policy responses.

Factors Contributing to Children’s Resiliency towards Disaster

Annually, millions of people (including children) across the world face minor to severe impact from natural or human-induced disasters. Diverse models have been conceptualized and adopted at global scale to increase resiliency of children from disasters focusing on preparedness, response and recover. As children spend most of their lives at school or at home, this paper discusses on factors contributing towards improving or degrading resiliency of children from disasters. Giving low priority to institutional resilience, this paper highlights the behavioral aspects of children which becomes their strength on demonstrating appropriate practices to mitigate disaster risks on self at school, home and community. While doing so, attributes from Ajzen&rsquo;s Theory of Planned Behavior has been linked with the components of resilience to explain the causative factors. Adopting desk review, this paper describes behavioral attributes of children and emphasizes on need of having multi-dimensional framework to enhance resiliency of children.