Sensemaking in the personal health space

Information ecology in digitalising welfare services: a multi-level analysis

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine and reinterpret information ecology in the context of the changing environment of services, which has been strongly affected by digitalisation and increasing citizen engagement. Here, information ecology refers to the interaction and co-evolution of technologies, human beings and the social environment.

Design/methodology/approach

The data consist of 25 thematic interviews conducted in a public Finnish organisation responsible for organising welfare services, and in its collaborating organisations. The interviews were analysed qualitatively. The analytical framework is based on Nardi and O'Day's five components of information ecology: system, diversity, co-evolution, keystone species and locality.

Findings

The analysis shows that these basic components still exist in the digitalisation era, but that they should be interpreted and highlighted differently, for example, stressing the openness of the information system instead of closed systems, as well as emphasising the increasing meaning of diversity amongst digitalisation, and the dynamic co-evolution between the elements of the system. New capabilities, such as the ability to combine various kinds of information and knowledge, are needed in this adaptation.

Research limitations/implications

The study illustrates a wider, updated information-ecology concept with the help of empirical research. Technology affects care organisations' information ecologies in numerous – often invisible – ways, which this study brings into light.

Originality/value

So far, information-ecology research has overlooked social and healthcare, but this study provides findings concerning this societally important sector.

Crime and social media

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to complement the scant macroeconomic literature on the development outcomes of social media by examining the relationship between Facebook penetration and violent crime levels in a cross-section of 148 countries for the year 2012.

Design/methodology/approach

The empirical evidence is based on ordinary least squares (OLS), Tobit and quantile regressions. In order to respond to policy concerns on the limited evidence on the consequences of social media in developing countries, the data set is disaggregated into regions and income levels. The decomposition by income levels included: low income, lower middle income, upper middle income and high income. The corresponding regions include: Europe and Central Asia, East Asia and the Pacific, Middle East and North Africa (MENA), Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America.

Findings

From OLS and Tobit regressions, there is a negative relationship between Facebook penetration and crime. However, quantile regressions reveal that the established negative relationship is noticeable exclusively in the 90th crime quantile. Further, when the data set is decomposed into regions and income levels, the negative relationship is evident in the MENA while a positive relationship is confirmed for Sub-Saharan Africa. Policy implications are discussed.

Originality/value

Studies on the development outcomes of social media are sparse because of a lack of reliable macroeconomic data on social media. This study primarily complemented three existing studies that have leveraged on a newly available data set on Facebook.

What makes you feel attached to smartwatches? The stimulus–organism–response (S–O–R) perspectives

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to answer the question of whether smartwatches will survive and gain their own niche within the consumer electronics market. Based on the stimulus–organism–response (S–O–R) framework, this study identifies and validates the impacts of both technological and fashion-related factors (interactivity, autonomy, visual aesthetics and self-expression) on product attachment towards smartwatches through user satisfaction and pleasure derived from their smartwatches.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors collected the survey data via online surveys from 198 respondents and tested measurement and structural models with the partial least square technique.

Findings

The authors found that both technological characteristics (interactivity and autonomy) and fashion-related characteristics (visual aesthetics and self-expression) have an impact on product attachment through pleasure.

Research limitations/implications

Several other important characteristics of traditional wrist-watches such as durability or workmanship are not considered in this study, but should be included in future studies. The three-item measure of autonomy may be insufficient for more sophisticated wearable devices in the future. In future studies, the impact of product attachment on users’ continued usage should be examined.

Practical implications

This study provides important practical implications for smartwatch makers interested in product development, as users were found to consider fashion-related characteristics to be as important as technological characteristics.

Originality/value

This study is the first study that considers both aesthetic and technological factors for IT acceptance in the context of wearable devices. Also, instead of traditional IT acceptance measures such as continued use, this study investigates users’ product attachment, which is more relevant to the case of wearable devices.

Openness, ICT and entrepreneurship in sub-Saharan Africa

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine how information and communication technology (ICT) influences openness to improve the conditions of doing business in sub-Saharan Africa.

Design/methodology/approach

The data were collected for the period 2000-2012. ICT is proxied with internet and mobile phone penetration rates whereas openness is measured in terms of financial and trade globalisation. Ten indicators of doing business are used, namely: cost of business start-up procedures; procedure to enforce a contract; start-up procedures to register a business; time required to build a warehouse; time required to enforce a contract; time required to register a property; time required to start a business; time to export; time to prepare and pay taxes; and time to resolve an insolvency. The empirical evidence is based on generalised method of moments with forward orthogonal deviations.

Findings

While the authors find substantial evidence that ICT complements openness to improve conditions for entrepreneurship, the effects are contingent on the dynamics of openness, ICT and entrepreneurship. Theoretical and practical policy implications are discussed.

Originality/value

The inquiry is based on two contemporary development concerns: the need for policy to leverage on the ICT penetration potential in the sub-region and the relevance of entrepreneurship in addressing associated issues of population growth such as unemployment.

Comparative human development thresholds for absolute and relative pro-poor mobile banking in developing countries

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to assess the correlations between mobile banking and inclusive development (poverty and inequality) in 93 developing countries for the year 2011.

Design/methodology/approach

Mobile banking entails the following: “mobile phones used to pay bills” and “mobile phones used to receive/send money”, while the modifying policy indicator includes the human development index (HDI). The data are decomposed into seven sub-panels based on two fundamental characteristics: regions (Latin America, Asia and the Pacific, Central and Eastern Europe, and Middle East and North Africa) and income levels (upper middle income, lower middle income and low income).

Findings

The results show that at certain thresholds of the HDI, mobile banking is positively linked to inclusive development. The following specific findings are established. First, the increased use of mobile phones to pay bills is negatively correlated with: poverty in lower-middle-income countries (LMIC), upper-middle-income countries (UMIC) and Latin American (LA) countries, respectively, at HDI thresholds of 0.725, 0.727 and 0.778 and inequality in UMIC and LA with HDI thresholds of, respectively, 0.646 and 0.761. Second, the increased use of mobile phones to send/receive money is negatively correlated with: poverty in LMIC, UMIC and Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries with corresponding HDI thresholds of 0.631, 0.750 and 0.750 and inequality in UMIC, CEE and LA at HDI thresholds of 0.665, 0.736 and 0.726, respectively.

Practical implications

The findings are discussed in the light of current policy challenges in the transition from the UN’s Millennium Development Goals to Sustainable Development Goals.

Originality/value

The authors have exploited the only macroeconomic data on mobile banking currently available.