130,457 research outputs found
An investigation of the role of dependency in predicting continuance intention to use ubiquitous media systems: combining a media system perspective with expectation-confirmation theories
No full textThe mobile telecommunications landscape has evolved into a highly competitive and complex ecosystem composed of network operators, mobile device manufacturers as well as software, content and service providers. This major shift has strongly impacted the fundamental nature of mobile devices which have now become complex multi-purpose, multi-context ubiquitous media systems. Such change has engendered an urgent need to revisit our understanding of mobile device usage through the lens of theories that encompass the multifaceted nature of ubiquitous systems. Relying on a media perspective, the paper investigates the role of individual media dependency in predicting continuance intention to use ubiquitous media systems. Data collected from 150 smartphone users were used to test the developed conceptual model. The results confirmed the overall effect of ubiquitous media systems dependency on individuals’ reasoned continuance usage decision. The findings suggest that the level of dependency towards a ubiquitous media system inflates the perceived positive attributes about the system: perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, as well as the cognitive appraisal about the discrepancies between initial expectations and post-use performance. Theoretical and practical implications developed from these findings are then discussed.The mobile telecommunications landscape has evolved into a highly competitive and complex ecosystem composed of network operators, mobile device manufacturers as well as software, content and service providers. This major shift has strongly impacted the fundamental nature of mobile devices which have now become complex multi-purpose, multi-context ubiquitous media systems. Such change has engendered an urgent need to revisit our understanding of mobile device usage through the lens of theories that encompass the multifaceted nature of ubiquitous systems. Relying on a media perspective, the paper investigates the role of individual media dependency in predicting continuance intention to use ubiquitous media systems. Data collected from 150 smartphone users were used to test the developed conceptual model. The results confirmed the overall effect of ubiquitous media systems dependency on individuals’ reasoned continuance usage decision. The findings suggest that the level of dependency towards a ubiquitous media system inflates the perceived positive attributes about the system: perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, as well as the cognitive appraisal about the discrepancies between initial expectations and post-use performance. Theoretical and practical implications developed from these findings are then discussed.Uninvited Submission
Cutting bamboo down to size
No full textThis paper studies the problem of programming a robotic panda gardener to keep a bamboo garden from obstructing the view of the lake by your house. The garden consists of n bamboo stalks with known daily growth rates and the gardener can cut at most one bamboo per day. As a computer scientist, you found out that this problem has already been formalized in [Gasieniec et al., SOFSEM'17] as the Bamboo Garden Trimming (BGT) problem, where the goal is that of computing a perpetual schedule (i.e., the sequence of bamboos to cut) for the robotic gardener to follow in order to minimize the makespan, i.e., the maximum height ever reached by a bamboo. Two natural strategies are Reduce-Max and Reduce-Fastest(x). Reduce-Max trims the tallest bamboo of the day, while Reduce-Fastest(x) trims the fastest growing bamboo among the ones that are taller than x. It is known that Reduce-Max and Reduce-Fastest(x) achieve a makespan of O(log n) and 4 for the best choice of x = 2, respectively. We prove the first constant upper bound of 9 for Reduce-Max and improve the one for Reduce-Fastest(x) to 3+2v5 < 2.62 for x = 1 + v15. Another critical aspect stems from the fact that your robotic gardener has a limited amount of processing power and memory. It is then important for the algorithm to be able to quickly determine the next bamboo to cut while requiring at most linear space. We formalize this aspect as the problem of designing a Trimming Oracle data structure, and we provide three efficient Trimming Oracles implementing different perpetual schedules, including those produced by Reduce-Max and Reduce-Fastest(x)
A non-invasive monitoring on European wildcat (Felis silvestris silvestris Schreber, 1777) in Sicily using hair trapping and camera trapping: does scented lure work?
No full textAn hair trapping protocol, with camera trapping surveillance, was carried out on the south-western side of the Etna, inhabited by an abundant population of the European wildcat. We aimed to collect hair for genetic analysis on the base of a field study conducted in Switzerland, where valerian tincture had been used to attract wildcats to rub again wooden sticks and therefore leaving hairs. We placed 18 hair trapping stations, plus one camera trap per scented wooden stick, 1 km away from each other for 60 days (October 29 2010 to December 28 2010). The rate of "capture" success (1 capture / 24.5 trap-days) by camera trapping was substantially the same as those obtained during previous surveys performed in the same study area without the use of any attractants. No wildcats were photographed while rubbing against the wooden sticks, neither any wildcat was interested in the scent lure. We discuss limitations of the hair trapping, providing possible explanations on the failure of valerian tincture, while suggesting some field advices for future monitorings
An investigation of the role of dependency in predicting continuance intention to use ubiquitous media systems: Combining a media system perspective with expectation-confirmation theories
No full textThe mobile telecommunications landscape has evolved into a highly competitive and complex ecosystem composed of network operators, mobile device manufacturers as well as software, content and service providers. This major shift has strongly impacted the fundamental nature of mobile devices which have now become complex multi-purpose, multi-context ubiquitous media systems. Such change has engendered an urgent need to revisit our understanding of mobile device usage through the lens of theories that encompass the multifaceted nature of ubiquitous systems. Relying on a media perspective, the paper investigates the role of individual media dependency in predicting continuance intention to use ubiquitous media systems. Data collected from 150 smartphone users were used to test the developed conceptual model. The results confirmed the overall effect of ubiquitous media systems dependency on individuals' reasoned continuance usage decision. The findings suggest that the level of dependency towards a ubiquitous media system inflates the perceived positive attributes about the system: perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, as well as the cognitive appraisal about the discrepancies between initial expectations and post-use performance. Theoretical and practical implications developed from these findings are then discussed
Cutting bamboo down to size
No full textThis paper studies the problem of programming a robotic panda gardener to keep a bamboo garden from obstructing the view of the lake by your house. The garden consists of n bamboo stalks with known daily growth rates and the gardener can cut at most one bamboo per day. As a computer scientist, you found out that this problem has already been formalized in [Gąsieniec et al., SOFSEM'17] as the Bamboo Garden Trimming (BGT) problem, where the goal is that of computing a perpetual schedule (i.e., the sequence of bamboos to cut) for the robotic gardener to follow in order to minimize the makespan, i.e., the maximum height ever reached by a bamboo. Two natural strategies are Reduce-Max and Reduce-Fastest(x). Reduce-Max trims the tallest bamboo of the day, while Reduce-Fastest(x) trims the fastest growing bamboo among the ones that are taller than x. It is known that Reduce-Max and Reduce-Fastest(x) achieve a makespan of O(logn) and 4 for the best choice of x=2, respectively. We prove the first constant upper bound of 9 for Reduce-Max and improve the one for Reduce-Fastest(x) to [Formula presented] for [Formula presented]. Another critical aspect stems from the fact that your robotic gardener has a limited amount of processing power and memory. It is then important for the algorithm to be able to quickly determine the next bamboo to cut while requiring at most linear space. We formalize this aspect as the problem of designing a Trimming Oracle data structure, and we provide three efficient Trimming Oracles implementing different perpetual schedules, including those produced by Reduce-Max and Reduce-Fastest(x)
MeSH term explosion and author rank improve expert recommendations
No full textInformation overload is an often-cited phenomenon that reduces the productivity, efficiency and efficacy of scientists. One challenge for scientists is to find appropriate collaborators in their research. The literature describes various solutions to the problem of expertise location, but most current approaches do not appear to be very suitable for expert recommendations in biomedical research. In this study, we present the development and initial evaluation of a vector space model-based algorithm to calculate researcher similarity using four inputs: 1) MeSH terms of publications; 2) MeSH terms and author rank; 3) exploded MeSH terms; and 4) exploded MeSH terms and author rank. We developed and evaluated the algorithm using a data set of 17,525 authors and their 22,542 papers. On average, our algorithms correctly predicted 2.5 of the top 5/10 coauthors of individual scientists. Exploded MeSH and author rank outperformed all other algorithms in accuracy, followed closely by MeSH and author rank. Our results show that the accuracy of MeSH term-based matching can be enhanced with other metadata such as author rank
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
No full textThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
"Closing the R&D Gap, Evaluating the Sources of R&D Spending"
No full textBoth spending and tax policies have been implemented in the United States with the goal of stimulating private sector research and development (R&D). Karier questions whether current R&D policy, especially the research and experimentation tax credit, can contribute to closing the gap between nondefense expenditures on R&D in the United States and such expenditures in other countries, such as Japan and Germany. He also explores possible changes to our current R&D policy to make it more effective.
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
No full textWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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