Eoin Whelan, Willie Golden and Monideepa Tarafdar
Social networking sites (SNS) are heavily used by university students for personal and academic purposes. Despite their benefits, using SNS can generate stress for many people…
Abstract
Purpose
Social networking sites (SNS) are heavily used by university students for personal and academic purposes. Despite their benefits, using SNS can generate stress for many people. SNS stressors have been associated with numerous maladaptive outcomes. The objective in this study is to investigate when and how SNS use damages student achievement and psychological wellbeing.
Design/methodology/approach
Combining the theoretical perspectives from technostress and the strength model of self-control, this study theoretically develops and empirically tests the pathways which explain how and when SNS stressors harm student achievement and psychological wellbeing. The authors test the research model through a two-wave survey of 220 SNS using university students.
Findings
The study extends existing research by showing that it is through the process of diminishing self-control over SNS use that SNS stressors inhibit achievement and wellbeing outcomes. The study also finds that the high use of SNS for academic purposes enhances the effect of SNS stressors on deficient SNS self-control.
Originality/value
This study further opens up the black box of the social media technostress phenomenon by documenting and validating novel processes (i.e. deficient self-control) and conditions (i.e. enhanced academic use) on which the negative impacts of SNS stressors depend.
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Keywords
Martin Hughes, Murray Scott and Willie Golden
To investigate the role of business process redesign (BPR) in creating citizen‐centred e‐government.
Abstract
Purpose
To investigate the role of business process redesign (BPR) in creating citizen‐centred e‐government.
Design/methodology/approach
It is argued in this paper that the evolutionary‐based development of BPR is better positioned to expand the use e‐commerce technology in the public sector. The Venkatraman model of IT‐enabled change is used in order to investigate the extent to which BPR was instrumental in the movement to e‐government in Ireland. A case study is presented detailing how the Irish Government's e‐government strategy was devised and implemented.
Findings
This paper details how 50 government authorities were co‐ordinated in an effort to provide a single point of access (portal) to government e‐services. However, as the infrastructure for the portal is to be developed around existing government structures, a full and complete process redesign is unlikely, as the existing authorities must remain in place.
Research limitations/implications
To investigate the unique nature of processes within the public sector so that IS platforms can be developed that accommodate less efficient processes rather than platforms that require unobtainable process redesign.
Practical implications
The establishment of a specific government entity, whose sole purpose is to oversee and implement the e‐government strategy, has contributed greatly to the success achieved to date.
Originality/value
This paper fulfils an identified need for research in BPR in the implementation of e‐government and provides a valuable insight into the successful attainment of citizen‐centred e‐government in other jurisdictions.
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Keywords
Thomas Acton and Willie Golden
The IT workforce of a company may embody its most important strategic asset. Such an asset needs to be managed. At a company level, measures that support and encourage knowledge…
Abstract
The IT workforce of a company may embody its most important strategic asset. Such an asset needs to be managed. At a company level, measures that support and encourage knowledge transfer amongst employees can help minimise the effect of the loss of skilled staff. This paper details the results of a survey administered to 200 employees across 39 software companies in Ireland. The study assessed the impact of training practices on employee retention, gathered data on the effects of training initiatives, the types of training in use, and the influence of training on knowledge retention. Results demonstrate that organisational attitudes and provision for training relate positively to employee expectations and requirements. Well‐engineered training initiatives lead to increased organisational strength, job‐related employee competencies, and job satisfaction. Training helps in retaining knowledge within the organisation, but may not help in retaining employees. Almost one third of respondents believe that training received has not helped to reduce job‐related stress and more than one quarter indicate that their organisation does not structure training based on employee feedback on requirements.
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The purpose of this paper is to distinguish the economic foundations of post‐Communist capitalism and to examine the key economic problems of this type of society in the context…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to distinguish the economic foundations of post‐Communist capitalism and to examine the key economic problems of this type of society in the context of the modern financial crisis.
Design/methodology/approach
This question is approached by studying the “necroeconomy” as a phenomenon of post‐Communist capitalism and the international experience of the dead firms, so‐called “zombie‐firms”, which do exist and “successfully” function in the most developed of economies as well with Japan being the most obvious example. Unlike developed economies, which are exposed to the threat of the zombie‐ing of the economy under the conditions of a financial crisis, this threat is even greater for the countries of post‐Communist capitalism owing also to their exposure to necroeconomy.
Findings
It is found that the financial crisis creates the favourable conditions for the zombie‐ing of a necroeconomy. If in Japan, for example, the zombie‐economy never touched the processing industries, then one of the qualities of the necroeconomy is to concentrate exactly upon this sector of the economy. The zombie‐ing of a necroeconomy inevitably amounts to the zombie‐ing of this already‐dead sector as well.
Originality/value
The value of the paper is to determine the carriers of the necroeconomic and zombie‐economic routines – Homo Transformaticus and Zombie Economicus, respectively. The contemporary financial crisis creates the danger of the transformation of Homo Transformaticus into a Zombie Economicus.
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THERE'S ONLY one topic for 1973. In the pubs and in the papers. On the telly and in the train. Bus queues are buzzing with it. Launderettes are loud with it. From Curzon Street to…
Abstract
THERE'S ONLY one topic for 1973. In the pubs and in the papers. On the telly and in the train. Bus queues are buzzing with it. Launderettes are loud with it. From Curzon Street to Coronation Street the question on everyone's lips is:
Looks at the life and poetry of W.B. Yeats to establish whether or not he engaged in marketing and what his marketing practices were. Uses Yeats as an example of Irish marketing…
Abstract
Looks at the life and poetry of W.B. Yeats to establish whether or not he engaged in marketing and what his marketing practices were. Uses Yeats as an example of Irish marketing at its best. Suggests that a Celtic Marketing Era will reappear to challenge the established “Anglo‐Saxon” approach to marketing and marketing education.
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According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV-TR, American Psychiatric Association (APA), 2000), autistic spectrum disorders (ASD) are a…
Abstract
According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV-TR, American Psychiatric Association (APA), 2000), autistic spectrum disorders (ASD) are a collection of chronic conditions that include Autistic Disorder, Rett's Disorder, Childhood Disintegrative Disorder, Aspeger's Disorder, and Pervasive Developmental Disorder Not Otherwise Specified. Typically, ASD are often identified during infancy or the toddler years. Most individuals with ASD have some degree of mental retardation. According to Deisinger (2001), genetic factors, abnormalities in brain structure and biochemistry, and complications during pregnancy have been implicated as possible causes of these disorders. Generally, students with ASD have difficulties with daily activities such as language, self-care, mobility, and independent functioning. The focus of this chapter examines the many features that must be considered before diagnosing and classifying individuals with ASD.
David Hume's image, as produced by his fellow Scot, Allan Ramsey, is printed large on the hardback cover of David Hume's political economy. This handsome portrait captures Hume's…
Abstract
David Hume's image, as produced by his fellow Scot, Allan Ramsey, is printed large on the hardback cover of David Hume's political economy. This handsome portrait captures Hume's confidence and intelligence and displays, in its scarlet cloth, fine lace and elaborately worked, golden trim, Hume as a successful philosophe, a man of knowledge and also of commercial success (a success of considerable psychological importance for Hume, and a source of pride) founded upon the literary works on which his left arm rests. Indeed, without the significant reference to the books, this could as well be the portrait of a Scottish merchant or affluent banker, both types ranked among his Edinburgh friends. Hume with no University post and no inherited income worth speaking of made the most of the commercial possibilities open to authorship. This is a refined, even luxurious painting, and brings together in one enduring image, at least for those in the know, Hume's notion of “luxury” or of “Refinement in the Arts” and the idea of virtue in commercial society. This is a fitting cover for a work that places Hume's political economy firmly in the contexts of his notion of a science of human nature and of the role of virtue in commercial society.
Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Term. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are…
Abstract
Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Term. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.