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The main purpose of this study is to determine the factors affecting the adoption of telemedicine services as mobile health apps in the Jordanian context by extending the technology acceptance model (TAM).

A quantitative research approach with an online survey was used to collect data from 306 Jordanian respondents to achieve the main purpose. The partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) approach was used to analyze collected data.

The results mainly confirmed that the intention to use mobile health apps (otherwise known as AMAN apps in Jordan) is significantly influenced by social influence, perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, trust in government and social media awareness. Next, contrary to what is expected, culture does not moderate the association between perceived ease of use and behavioral intention to use the AMAN app, and hence the related hypothesis was not supported. To conclude, the results show that the actual use of the AMAN app is significantly influenced by behavioral intention, and hence, the final hypothesis was supported.

The current research contributed to the literature on information technology (IT)/information systems (IS) acceptance and use by switching the investigation efforts from the acceptance of IT/IS to the adoption of protection technology in the crisis era.

In Ghana, the adoption and application of green building concepts and technologies have not been fully explored. The study aimed to look into the key barriers and how they affect this.

Purposive and snowball sampling techniques were used to select a total of 292 construction industry stakeholders in Ghana who provided information via a questionnaire survey used for the data collection. Exploratory factor analysis and Partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) were used for computing the data analyses.

According to the study findings, the top five most critical barriers to the uptake of green building concepts and technologies (GBCs and Ts) in Ghana are: lack of government incentives/supports for implementing green building technologies (GBTs), lack of knowledge and awareness of GBTs and their benefits, lack of GBTs databases and information, Lack of green building (GB) expertise/skilled labour and Higher costs of GBTs. Principal Component Factor Analysis was used to further analyse the data, which allowed for the reduction of the 27 (27) factors to just four (4) underlying critical barriers: (1) government and knowledge-associated barriers, (2) technical barriers, (3) cost and finance barriers and (4) stakeholders’ attitude barriers. PLS-SEM techniques were used to analyse this collection of barriers, and the results showed that stakeholders’ attitude-associated barriers and cost and finance-related barriers have a significant negative influence on the uptake of GBCs and Ts in Ghana. This study’s findings have provided empirical evidence of the critical barriers to the uptake of GBCs and Ts from all stakeholders. Stakeholders desirous of implementing GBCs and Ts would work against the negative influences on the uptake of GBCs and TS.

Although there has been an abundance of research to examine the critical barriers to GB, however, the uniqueness of this study is nested in modelling the influence of the barriers on the adoption of GBCs and Ts using the PLS-SEM path modelling.

After considering the price reversal among countries' indices as a global, coordinated and generalized phenomenon, this paper aims to examine the profitability of the reversal strategy internationally and find an economically essential and predictive reversal effect. Indices' portfolios form based on the prior 48 months; prior losers outperform prior winners by 8.86% per year during the subsequent 48 months. Interestingly, the reversal effect is substantially stronger for emerging countries, yielding 14.04% annually. It remains profitable post-globalization, countering the concern of whether the integration of equity markets synchronized the price reversal worldwide. Returns' differences consistent with portfolio formation approaches are also observed.

This study follows the methodology De Bondt and Thaler (1985) set out and uses the same methodological framework Wouassom et al. (2022) put forward. Nevertheless, this study does not focus on stocks. Still, it employs global equity indices from the viewpoint of an international investor who can switch between worldwide equity indices using a contrarian trading strategy.

My findings indicate that reversal strategies with overlapping portfolios are profitable over the entire sample period and every formation and holding period. These returns are highly statistically significant and vary considerably from one horizon to another. More importantly, the reversal strategies remain, on average, profitable and significant in the period post-1994 but are not particularly distinctive, which implies that the reversal effect survives the globalization impact and indicates that the integration of equity markets together with the international correlation among markets do not synchronize the prices reversal effect around the world given that.

Further work would be recommended to study a more extended period dating back to the nineteenth century or the Victorian Era, characterised by rapid economic development in almost every domain, to verify if reversal is historically compensation for carrying risks exclusively during contraction.

My analysis takes on particular significance given the association between lagged market movement in share prices and investors’ optimism that appears among traders, generating an increasing reversal effect (Siganos and Chelley-Steley, 2006) and has direct implications for predicting and controlling trading costs associated with asset allocation strategies.

The difficulty with using the reversal strategy to uncover the long-term return reversal effects in the equity markets today resides in the fact that the globalization of the economy has fuelled the concentration of assets within institutional investors. The critical insight is that the concentration of equity in the hands of institutional investors activated international equity trading. These institutional investors seek to maximize their shareholder value from the opportunity by simultaneously dealing in many markets while constructing and holding portfolios that include assets from various countries using highly profitable investment strategies such as reversal.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper to show an easily implemented contrarian strategy that switches back and forth between country indices and generates extraordinarily high abnormal returns of more than 8.86% per annum. We also show that these returns compensate for global risks and for investors ready to take them during contraction.

This study aims to investigate the effect of stock repurchase – firms buying back their own stocks – on firm performance, focusing specifically on the role of marketing capability. The authors also investigate the moderating influence of competitive intensity on this effect. This research sheds light on how marketing capability explains the negative effect of stock repurchase on firm performance, and how this effect varies in different competitive intensity environments.

The authors test their hypotheses using US firm-level longitudinal data collected from a sample set of firms obtained from the Compustat database for the 1989–2015 period. The authors specify a panel data regression model to test the hypotheses.

The authors find that adoption of stock repurchase ultimately results in a decrease in firm performance, through a decrease in marketing capability. The authors also find that the indirect effect of stock repurchase on firm performance is moderated by firm competitive intensity, such that at higher levels of competitive intensity, the negative relationship between stock repurchase and marketing capability will become amplified and at lower levels of competitive intensity, the negative relationship between stock repurchase and marketing capability will get attenuated.

This study indicates that the risk from stock repurchase is the diversion of funds from other beneficial activities such as marketing budgets, leading to lowered marketing capability.

This study's results will help managers improve their understanding of the dark side of the stock repurchase strategy and help take corrective action.

The present study empirically tests the effects of stock repurchase on marketing capability and firm performance.

In the Global North, affordable housing has evolved and thrived, and it is now gaining traction in the Global South, where governments have been vocal supporters of the concept. Therefore, this paper aims to investigate the important criteria for selecting affordable housing units in Ghana.

A quantitative research approach was used, and a survey was administered to the residents. The data was analysed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. The relative importance index technique was used to rank the important criteria, and the EFA technique was used to create a taxonomy system for the criteria.

The hierarchical ranking of the most significant criteria for selecting affordable housing includes community safety, waste management and access to good-quality education. Furthermore, the important criteria for selecting affordable housing are classified into two groups, namely, “sustainability criteria” and “housing demand and supply and social service provision”.

This study has implications for the real estate industry and construction stakeholders, as this will inform decision-making in terms of the design of affordable housing and the suitability of the location for the development.

These findings provide a baseline to support potential homeowners and tenants in their quest to select affordable housing. Furthermore, these findings will aid future longitudinal research into the indicators or criteria for selecting suitable locations for the development of low- and middle-income housing.

Intelligence transformation has hugely influenced business operation in many industries and countries, such as in the emerging market. Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) adoption by organisations is a significant result of transformation. However, the influence of GAI adoption on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) has been given less attention in business and management studies. In particular, managing the relationship of employees in GAI adoption is a focal point during the transformation from an ethical, responsible and sustainable perspective. Drawing on organisational socialisation and technology adoption theories, this chapter develops a process of socialising newcomers and/or existing employees in the development of GAI adoption in their workflow with identification of challenges and strategies to the adapt to the change. This discussion can help managers and other key persons to effectively manage the relationship and interactions between employees and technology (GAI) in a more ethical, responsible and sustainable manner.

Despite the burgeoning popularity of virtual gifting in live streaming, research lacks an in-depth understanding of the drivers behind this behavior. Using para-social relationship (PSR), this study aims to capture viewers’ lively social feelings toward the streamer as the key factor leading to the purchase behavior of virtual gifts. It also aims to establish a theoretical link between PSR and viewers’ holistic experience in live streaming as captured by cognitive absorption and aims to investigates the role of technological features (i.e. viewer–streamer and viewer–viewer interactivity, streamer-level and viewer-level deep profiling and design aesthetics) in shaping viewers’ experience.

Based on 433 survey responses, this study employs a combination of structural equation modeling and neural networks to offer valuable insights into the relationships between the technological environment, viewer experience and viewer behavior.

Our results highlight the salience of PSR in promoting the purchase of virtual gifts through cognitive absorption and the importance of the technological environment in eliciting the viewer experience. This study sheds light on the development of PSR in a technological environment and its relationship with cognitive absorption.

By applying PSR to conceptualize viewers’ perceived connection with the streamer, this study extends the research on purchase behavior in the non-shopping context by providing an enlightened understanding of virtual gift purchase behavior in live streaming. Moreover, by theoretically linking PSR with cognitive absorption, virtual gift purchase and technological features of live streaming, it enriches the theory of PSR and bridges the gap between the design practice of supporting the IT infrastructure of live streaming and research.

This research aims to investigate the interplay between flexibilities and strategic orientations in the context of supply chain agility (SCA), particularly in the medical equipment supply chain. The study seeks to identify key internal and external flexibility factors, along with the firm’s strategic orientations, and understand why and how these factors are interrelated and contribute to the development or enhancement of SCA.

The study adopts an inductive exploratory multiple case study design to empirically identify and examine the underlying flexibility and strategic orientation factors and their link to SCA. Data collection tools included semi-structured interviews and access to key company documentation and archives from six major medical equipment suppliers in Jordan.

The research findings lead to the proposal of an emerging theoretical model describing the nature of relationships among internal/external flexibility factors, strategic orientations and SCA, with underlying research propositions that can later be subjected to deductive testing and empirical quantitative validation.

This research advances the theoretical understanding of SCA by investigating its strategic antecedents, including various orientations and their direct and indirect effects. Second, it provides a comprehensive insight into the combined impact of internal and external flexibilities on SCA, an aspect relatively underexplored in previous literature.

Universal Health Coverage (UHC) means that all people can access quality essential health services, without having to suffer financial hardship. However, this remains a significant challenge in many parts of Africa, particularly for marginalized populations in hard-to-reach communities as the financial burden continues to be placed on the poor citizens. The rapid advancement of digital technologies has changed the healthcare landscape by introducing new, frugal methods for healthcare delivery, holding the potential to bridge the healthcare gap and enhance access to quality healthcare for marginalized populations. While the notion of frugal innovation (FI) is gaining worldwide traction, the application of digital technologies in driving FIs within African healthcare systems remains largely untapped. With this aim, the research conducted a comprehensive literature review and searched for articles that addressed digital technologies in the medical field and technology-enabled disruptive digital frugal innovations (DFIs), particularly in the healthcare sector in Africa from Scopus indexed journals. In addition, the technologies identified are examined with respect to their innovation characteristics. Inclusion and exclusion criterion were clearly defined. The inclusion criteria considered studies that explored digital technologies and their intervention characteristics and DFIs in healthcare. Articles that were excluded from the study consisted of those not written in English, studies that addressed broader aspects of technology without specific emphasis on DFIs in healthcare.

Following Howard Bowen's legacy for responsible business practices, together with the actual growing pressure of societal problems, such as climate change, social inequality, geopolitics instability, etc., business leaders all around the world are being asked, if not demanded, to show and act as action persons who effectively contribute to a better common value creation. This confluence of situations has led to many CEOs feeling pressured to take a stand in sociopolitical themes, many times outside their businesses' areas, which have become known as CEO activism.

This study aimed to explore if and how this international growing trend is manifesting in the Portuguese context, by exploring the perspective of Portuguese CEOs on the topic, the course of action that they are taking, and how they evaluate risks and opportunities.

For these purposes, we implemented a qualitative methodology based on interviews to 24 Portuguese CEOs and used thematic analysis to explore them. Our findings reveal that, although Portuguese CEOs are aware of this trend, they acknowledge both risks and opportunities, and their activism is still incipient. Plus, they strongly believe that CEO activism must be aligned with the values and mission of the organization they represent. Finally, Portuguese CEOs are convinced of activism being genuine, and therefore should be first implemented within the organization, which is where most of them focus their action. Our work provides an original mapping of the CEO activism landscape in Portugal and an insightful discussion of the CEO's perspective on this growing phenomenon.