Search results

The purpose of the presented research paper is to explore the different aspects of crowdsourcing and its evolution over time. Supported by three different case studies, the research focuses on the different factors that affect crowdsourcing for open innovation. Moreover, the findings give us a proposed managerial framework to be considered when adopting crowdsourcing in addition to factors that proved its huge effect on crowdsourcing activities.

A qualitative research approach for this research was the most convenient. It focuses on providing an in-depth understanding of the phenomena. Qualitative research represents the views and perspectives of the participants in a study besides it is driven by a desire to explain these events, through existing or emerging concepts (Yin, 2016). Adopting a case study research method that investigates a contemporary phenomenon (the “case”) in depth and within its real-world context, especially when the boundaries between phenomenon and context may not be evident (Yin, 2018) as in crowdsourcing based business model for open innovation.

The researchers presented the benefits and challenges when considering crowdsourcing establishing a managerial framework for open innovation. Additionally, the researchers identified the different factors that highly affect crowdsourcing proposing a model that can be used for adopting crowdsourcing. The research also presented insights about how crowdsourcing was introduced in the Egyptian market and how it evolved through the years.

The study had some limitations to be considered in the following work. Company X used crowdsourcing within a high degree of limitations and confidentially consequently, restricting the effects and results of crowdsourcing. Another limitation was that the study has been only qualitative, and the addition of the quantitative approach will numerically support the findings. Moreover, the research depended on the businesses only as of the source of information and neglected the crowd sample.

The main aim of this study was to address the lack of research evidence on what it means to adopt crowdsourcing for open innovation in Egyptian firms. The authors have done so by adopting three case studies which enabled them to directly observe and report on the daily work of trust CEOs, with special attention to the practices. Whereby, these executives made themselves knowledgeable for all practical purposes, as dictated by their specific job. Accordingly, the first major contribution of the present research is that it provides much-needed empirical data on the actual practices of crowdsourcing in three Egyptian, yet international companies. Moreover, the results could be used as a guideline when considering crowdsourcing activities highlighting the advantages and disadvantages of such activities.

The paper discusses different perspectives of crowdsourcing presenting a new categorization for its types. Moreover, how these types have been used especially in the Egyptian market. On the other hand, the paper investigated and documented three different sized companies' experiences utilizing crowdsourcing for innovation. The collected information was used to suggest a new model by which companies can avoid the difficulties others had. Moreover, the research highlighted the benefits and challenges of using crowdsourcing for open innovation.

The purpose of this paper is to report the findings of a study to explore the Egyptian social science scholars’ academic writing behaviour in local and international context. Understanding the challenges that scholars in social science and humanities face while publishing in the international outlets would help to suggest strategies to improve academic writing in non-Arabic journals.

This study deployed mixed methods approach. The quantitative data were collected using an online questionnaire. Interviews were conducted with a group of scholars in the five faculties to elucidate the publishing behaviour of the sample.

The interviews and the questionnaire showed that social science scholars in Egypt prefer local publishing outlets. The number of scholars who publish internationally is very low compared to scholars who publish locally. Scholars who tried to publish internationally faced many challenges, such as language barriers, lack of academic writing skills and lack of appropriate training.

This study was conducted in one university in Egypt. While the results can be generalised to Egyptian and Middle East universities, it cannot be generalised to non-Arab communities because of the differences in culture and education system.

This study provides insight on publishing practices in the international context among social science scholars in Egypt using a mixed methods approach. This helped to capture the scholarly publishing practices and the attitude toward international publishing and the main challenges that scholars face who attempt to publish in international outlets.

Social engineering is crucial in today’s digital landscape. As technology advances, malicious individuals exploit human judgment and trust. This study explores how age, education and occupation affect individuals’ awareness, skills and perceptions of social engineering.

A quantitative research approach was used to survey a diverse demographic of Egyptian society. The survey was conducted in February 2023, and the participants were sourced from various Egyptian social media pages covering different topics. The collected data was analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics, including independent samples t-test and ANOVA, to compare awareness and skills across different groups.

The study revealed that younger individuals and those with higher education tend to research social engineering more frequently. Males display a higher level of awareness but score lower in terms of social and psychological consequences as well as types of attacks when compared to females. The type of attack cannot be predicted based on age. Higher education is linked to greater awareness and ability to defend against attacks. Different occupations have varying levels of awareness, skills, and psychosocial consequences. The study emphasizes the importance of increasing awareness, education and implementing cybersecurity measures.

This study’s originality lies in its focus on diverse Egyptian demographics, innovative recruitment via social media, comprehensive exploration of variables, statistical rigor, practical insights for cybersecurity education and diversity in educational and occupational backgrounds.

The rapid spread and severity of the coronavirus (COVID-19) virus have prompted a spate of scholarly research that deals with the pandemic. The purpose of this study is to measure and assess the coverage of COVID-19 research on social media and the engagement of readers with COVID-19 research on social media outlets.

An altmetric analysis was carried out in three phases. The first focused on retrieving all papers related to COVID-19. Phase two of the research aimed to measure the presence of the retrieved papers on social media using altmetric application programming interface (API). The third phase aimed to measure Mendeley readership categories using Mendeley API to extract data of readership from Mendeley for each paper.

The study suggests that while social media platforms do not give accurate measures of the impact as given by citations, they can be used to portray the social impact of the scholarly outputs and indicate the effectiveness of COVID-19 research. The results confirm a positive correlation between the number of citations to articles in databases such as Scopus and the number of views on social media sites such as Mendeley and Twitter. The results of the current study indicated that social media could serve as an indicator of the number of citations of scientific articles.

This study’s limitation is that the studied articles’ altmetrics performance was examined using only one of the altmetrics data service providers (altmetrics database). Hence, future research should explore altmetrics on the topic using more than one platform. Another limitation of the current research is that it did not explore the academic social media role in spreading fake information as the scope was limited to scholarly outputs on social media. The practical contribution of the current research is that it informs scholars about the impact of social media platforms on the spread and visibility of COVID-19 research. Also, it can help researchers better understand the importance of published COVID-19 research using social media.

This paper provides insight into the impact of COVID-19 research on social media. The paper helps to provide an understanding of how people engage with health research using altmetrics scores, which can be used as indicators of research performance.

This study investigates the effect of protection motivation theory (PMT) constructs on Arab women's feelings while seeking information during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The study has adopted a mixed-method approach using semi-structured interviews and a questionnaire to explore PMT constructs' impact on women's feelings while seeking information on COVID-19. Several tests, such as standard deviation, mean, skewness, kurtosis and persons, were used to check the reliability of data and inter-relationships between constructs.

The study results show a significant positive correlation between PMT constructs (perceived vulnerability, perceived severity, response efficacy, self-efficacy and response cost) with the feelings of Arab women during information seeking on COVID-19. However, the relationship between threat appraisal and feelings during information seeking was more substantial than coping appraisal and feelings during information seeking. The researchers hope that this study creates a baseline of cross-cultural studies on PMT constructs' effect on women's feelings while seeking health information.

The current study was conducted on female participants only. While the study intended to examine Arab women's feelings during information seeking with PMT's application, the results may be affected by other factors that were not considered in the current study. Furthermore, the questionnaire was distributed in three Arab countries, which means that the results cannot be generalized in other geographical contexts. Therefore, similar studies need to be conducted in larger geographical areas as cultural factors may produce different results.

This study explores women's feelings while seeking COVID-19 information using the PMT constructs. As far as we know, this study is the first study to investigate Arab women's feelings while seeking health information during pandemics. PMT utilization is considered a new approach to discover and measure informational needs and feelings associated with it during pandemics.

This paper aims to investigate the performance of two novel direct torque control (DTC) schemes dedicated to three-switch three-phase inverter (B3-VSI), also called delta inverter, fed induction motor (IM) drives.

The principle of operation of the B3-VSI-fed IM drive is recalled in a first step. Then, the basis of both proposed DTC strategies is presented. The first DTC scheme considers a subdivision of the stationary plane into three sectors and the application of the intrinsic as well as virtual voltage vectors to achieve the control combinations. While, the second DTC scheme considers a subdivision of the stationary plane into six sectors and a limitation of the voltage vectors incorporated in the look-up table to the three intrinsic ones.

Simulation and experimental results have revealed that, under steady-state operation and transient conditions, the harmonic content of the IM stator phase currents is lower in the case of the DTC2 strategy, resulting in a lower ripple of electromagnetic torque. Furthermore, it has led to a quasi-circular shape of the locus described by the stator flux vector in the stationary plane.

This work should be extended to the synthesis and performance analysis of a new DTC strategy for B3-VSI-fed IM drive, which emulates the operation of the conventional six-switch three-phase inverter-fed IM drive.

The limitation associated with the reduced number of the intrinsic voltage vectors generated by the B3-VSI has been eradicated, thanks to the suitable synthesis of the look-up table incorporated in the DTC scheme.

The conceptualization of smart emerged by technological advancements penetrated the tourism industry with the pace of globalization transformed the destinations providing digitalized products. Even though smart tourism destinations are initiated by advanced technologies, the notion evolved in embracing Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) project economic, social, and environmental proliferation. A tourism destination is counted as “smart” which provides advanced technologies to improve the quality of tourists' experiences and enhance the residents' quality of life. The structure of a smart tourism destination is established on four basic pillars that cover technology, innovation, accessibility, and sustainability issues. Designating the notion of smart into tourism destinations is extremely vital since the shifting paradigm of tourists’ demands concern sustainability. The development of smart in a tourism destination is a crucial concern for destination management organizations (DMOs) integrating key destination components with the dimensions of a smart city to enhance the tourists' satisfaction and competitiveness of the destination. Therefore, one aim of this chapter is to elucidate the association between key destination components with the dimensions of a smart city to reveal the related smart tourism destination applications. Moreover, cultural heritage in smart tourism destinations forms an important part of tourism both with its tangible and intangible resources which have been involved in the emergent era of digitalization inevitably with all parties and processes. Hence, another aim of this chapter is to examine the dimensional shift in cultural heritage tourism within the framework of digitalization. Sharing cases of digitization of cultural heritage from different parts of the world, this chapter also reflects that it is inevitable to benefit from digitization and ICTs in order to reach the SDGs on the scale of smart tourism destinations. Analysis of academic publications and the national and international reports of the related authorities sums the methodology used to conclude the study with suggestions of future research paths to develop the field.

The purpose of this paper is to report a study into: the motives that dispose customers in Bahrain to choose a specific bank; the level of familiarity of customers with the most widely used services/products offered by Islamic banks; and the extent of use of those products.

This is the first study conducted in Bahrain to include three types of bank clients: those who bank with conventional banks, those who bank with Islamic banks, and who use both kinds of banks. The results are based on a response rate of 65.5 percent from 1,000 questionnaires distributed. Descriptive statistics and non‐parametric statistics (Mann‐Whitney and Kruskal‐Wallis tests) are reported, and factor analysis used to analyze the responses.

It is found that: Islamic religious belief and social responsibility are the two most important factors that determine bank selection. Cost benefit is the third most important factor considered in bank selection; clients of conventional and Islamic banks share a number of motives, but they differ significantly on a few motives in relation to bank selection; and clients of Islamic banks are more familiar with the products/services that conform to the sharia'a. Overall, for clients who bank exclusively with Islamic banks, and for those who bank in different kinds of banks, the most widely used product/service of Islamic banks is murabaha.

The most important practical implication is for banks, conventional and Islamic, when setting and implementing their marketing strategies, which should include an awareness campaign. The results also benefit banks operating in the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). This is because of the similarities of the countries in the GCC.

This paper is the first attempt to identify the motives and criteria for bank selection in Bahrain among clients of conventional banks, Islamic banks, and clients who bank with both types of banks. The study goes on to determine the extent of familiarity of clients of banks in Bahrain with the products/services that comply with Islamic sharia'a.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the potential factors that may affect the level of corporate internet reporting by Egyptian listed companies.

The content analysis approach to examine the information cited by the largest Egyptian companies is used in their web sites. The paper modifies and uses the disclosure index of Xiao et al. Ordinary least square multiple regression analysis is used to examine the determinants of the internet reporting.

It is found that 56 per cent of Egyptian companies report a significant portion of information on their web sites. In addition, the paper finds that some financial characteristics explain the variation in the degree of internet reporting between Egyptian listed companies. In particular, profitability, foreign listing and industrial type (communications and financial services) are the determinants of the amount and presentation formatting of information disclosed on Egyptian companies' web sites. However, other firm characterises, such as firm size, leverage, liquidity and auditor size, do not explain corporate internet reporting.

The research finding is essential as it assists in informing regulators about the characteristics of Egyptian companies that are, and are not, satisfying national and international investors' demand of updated/online information. It also assists current and potential stakeholders to know the drives of corporate internet reporting in Egypt. Consequently, they may further investigate and verify such reporting practices. In practice, online reporting can be used as an effective tool for improving stakeholders' decision‐making process. Therefore, further research can be undertaken to examine the degree to which online reporting provides value‐relevant information for stakeholders.

To the best of the knowledge, there is no study examining the potential drivers of internet corporate reporting practice in Egypt. This paper is the first to examine the potential factors affecting corporate internet reporting in Egypt. The disclosure index used is designed to be suitable for companies working in the Egyptian environment.

Renal failure is an end-stage consequence after persistent hyperglycemia during diabetic nephropathy (DN), and the etiology of DN has been linked to oxidative stress. The purpose of this research was to determine the beneficial synergistic effects of S-Allyl Cysteine (SAC) and Taurine (TAU) on oxidative damage in the kidneys of type 2 diabetic rats induced by hyperglycemia.

Experimental diabetes was developed by administering intraperitoneal single dose of streptozotocin (STZ; 65 mg/kg) with nicotinamide (NA; 230 mg/kg) in adult rats. Diabetic and control rats were treated with SAC (150 mg/kg), TAU (200 mg/kg) or SAC and TAU combination (75 + 100 mg/kg) for four weeks. The estimation of body weight, fasting blood glucose (FBG), oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT), oxidative stress markers along with kidney histopathology was done to investigate the antidiabetic potential of SAC/TAU in the NA/STZ diabetic group.

The following results were obtained for the therapeutic efficacy of SAC/TAU: decrease in blood glucose level, decreased level of thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS) and increased levels of GSH, glutathione-s-transferase (GST) and catalase (CAT). SAC/TAU significantly modulated diabetes-induced histological changes in the kidney of rats.

SAC/TAU combination therapy modulated the oxidative stress markers in the kidney in diabetic rat model and also prevented oxidative damage as observed through histopathological findings.