http://dspace.cityu.edu.hk:80/handle/2031/712 2013-06-14T01:34:39Z 2013-06-14T01:34:39Z Xu, Wanying (許萬盈) http://dspace.cityu.edu.hk:80/handle/2031/6965 2013-06-13T02:37:31Z 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Understanding the sustainability of micro-blogging sites : an investigation of users' quality perceptions and continuance intentions Authors: Xu, Wanying (許萬盈) Abstract: Micro-blog is a new form of social communication service which allows users to post short contents on the Web through a variety of devices like smart phones, tablets, and PCs. Yet, its dramatic growth in the past few years is not likely to save it from competition and exempt its slowing growth. It's a great concern for micro-blogging sites to maintain its existing users. This study tries to explain the sustainability of micro-blogging sites from users' perspective, as it depends on users' behavior of continuance or not. While numerous studies have investigated users' adoption intention, few of them focus on users' post-adoption intention: continuance intention. Thus this research aims to answer two questions: (1) What are the salient factors contributing to users' continuance intention with micro-blogs? (2) How do these salient factors influence microblogging sites users' continuance intention? In this thesis, a research model was proposed to investigate the factors contributing to users' continuance intention of using micro-blogging sites. Building on the Information Systems (IS) Continuance Model, Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and Motivation Theory, this thesis proposed three antecedents for users' continuance intention, including perceived usefulness, satisfaction, and perceived enjoyment. Besides explaining users' continuance intention, this research also tried to find out the quality of micro-blogging sites that would lead to users' perception of ease of use, usefulness, and enjoyableness. Thus, following the IS success model and social capital theory, three types of micro-blogging sites' quality were proposed, including system quality, information quality, and social capital. All in all, by employing the IS Continuance Model, TAM, Motivation Theory, IS Success Model, and Social Capital Theory, this research examined seven factors which have direct or indirect effects on micro-blogs users' continuance intention. Face-to-face interviews as well as an online survey were employed to collect data for the test of the proposed model. To get an initial understanding of micro-blogs users' continuance intention, face-to-face interviews were conducted with 11 interviewees. And then an online survey study was carried out by distributing the questionnaire on Amazon's Mechanical Turk (MTurk). The data was analyzed using Partial Least Squares (PLS), and the results provided support for 11 out of the 12 hypotheses. In detail, the effect of satisfaction on users' continuance intention is supported in this study, which means satisfied users are more willing to continue to use the micro-blogs. Besides, users' perceived usefulness of the micro-blogging sites has a significant effect on users' continuance intention. This result pointed out the importance of providing utilitarian value to users even though micro-blogs are usually used in free time or at home. Furthermore, the results have confirmed that: (1) micro-blogs' system quality is positively related with users' perceived ease of use and (2) both information quality and social capital have significant effects on users' perception of usefulness as well as perceived enjoyment. Contrary to our expectation, users' perception on the enjoyment of using the micro-blogging sites fails to have a significant direct effect on continuance intention. Several possible explainations concerning the result were later discussed in the paper. This thesis entails significant implications for both research and practice. In terms of research, it provides a better understanding for the underlying mechanism of how users form their continuance intention toward micro-blogs. It also identifies micro-blogging sites' critical characteristics, which would contribute to users' beliefs towards the micro-blogs. For practice, it offers design guidelines for practitioners to sustain their existing users and micro-blogging sites. Notes: CityU Call Number: HM742 .X8 2012; viii, 121 leaves : ill. 30 cm.; Thesis (M.Phil.)--City University of Hong Kong, 2012.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 101-112)

2012-01-01T00:00:00Z Wang, Wei (王瑋) http://dspace.cityu.edu.hk:80/handle/2031/6964 2013-06-13T02:37:28Z 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Distributed traffic information systems : theory, simulation and prototype development Authors: Wang, Wei (王瑋) Abstract: Distributed traffic information systems (DTIS) are traffic information systems based on inter-vehicle communication. DTIS constitute a developing system that promises greater safety, comfort and convenience in transportation systems. Compared with centralized traffic information systems (CTIS), DTIS require less investment, have stronger resilience to disruptions and disasters and are more suitable for some vital traffic safety applications such as highway collision avoidance and advanced driver assistance systems. A number of projects (e.g., PATH; CarTalk; FleetNet) have explored enabling technologies and applications of DTIS. To guide the future deployment of DTIS, researchers have tried to construct theoretical models and use simulations to investigate DTIS performances under different traffic situations. This thesis conducts its research on DTIS from three perspectives-(1) theoretical model construction, (2) simulation software development, and (3) prototype application design. Firstly, it develops theoretical models to evaluate DTIS performance under different traffic situations. As a decentralized system, DTIS highly relies on inter-vehicle communication (IVC) as its information exchange infrastructure. Due to the limited communication coverage range, IVC depends on wireless-communication relay within traffic streams to transmit information. However, dynamic topology of IVC equipped vehicles (simply referred as "equipped vehicles" later) makes IVC not as reliable as centralized wireless communication. Since whether information can be timely transmitted through IVC to targeted vehicles is essential to the usability of DTIS, to analyze how fast information can be transmitted through IVC becomes an important research question. In this thesis, based on traffic-flow theory, probabilistic models are developed to predict mean value of IVC-message transmission speed, which can be used as indexes of IVC efficiencies. This model could provide analytical results for estimating DTIS performance. It reveals various traffic parameters’ (e.g., traffic density, traffic flow direction, traffic speed, and etc.) effects on DTIS efficiency. These would help DTIS design (e.g., help to decide how many equipped vehicles should be deployed for a certain DTIS service in a city) in the future. Secondly, a software package is developed for simulation of IVC in DTIS. Simulation is an important technique for research of DTIS. Compared with theoretical models, simulation could embrace more complicated traffic settings (e.g., traffic lights, traffic incidents and etc.) and can better help identify these traffic settings’ effects on DTIS. Furthermore, simulation provides an effective way for validating results of theoretical models. Based on a commercial microscopic traffic simulation tool -PARAMICS, a software package for simulations of IVC in DTIS is developed with C++. This software package provides a useful means for understanding how IVC message would spread in complex traffic scenarios. Moreover, theoretical results in this thesis are also verified with the software package’s simulation results. Thirdly, a prototype design of a typical application of DTIS - autonomous traffic-condition collecting & sharing - is conducted in this paper. The prototype design is divided into two parts in this paper. In part 1, the required equipped vehicle population size, which would guarantee the system’s normal functioning, is estimated with proposed theoretical models. In part 2, a prototype device for this application, including hardware part and software part, is developed. IEEE 802.11 a protocol is used as the IVC protocol for test because IEEE 802.11 p is based on IEEE 802.11 a. Experiments are done with prototype devices to show that the proposed application could provide new services to traffic users in real life. In conclusion, this thesis focuses its research on DTIS. Theoretical models and simulation tools are developed to investigate the performance of DTIS under different traffic scenarios. Furthermore, a prototype design for a typical DTIS application is finished in this thesis. The thesis’s contribution could be regarded as threefold: (1) It proposes an effective theoretical model for evaluating DTIS performance; (2) It develops an efficient software package for delicate DTIS simulation; (3) A prototype design is conducted to explore potential DTIS application which could be deployed in the future. Notes: CityU Call Number: TE228.3 .W36 2012; viii, 108 leaves : ill. 30 cm.; Thesis (Ph.D.)--City University of Hong Kong, 2012.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 89-108)

2012-01-01T00:00:00Z Mark, Kai Pan (麥啟彬) http://dspace.cityu.edu.hk:80/handle/2031/6963 2013-06-13T02:37:26Z 2012-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Exploring the antecedents of information systems habit formation in learning systems : roles of personalized IT applications and social effects Authors: Mark, Kai Pan (麥啟彬) Abstract: With the increasing number of digital native Information Systems (IS) users, one challenge in IS research is to sustain users' long term continuous IS usage, especially among digital natives. As reported in different studies, IS users generally show positive IS acceptance behavior at the beginning but negative long term IS continuance as time passes. This phenomenon is also common among users of different educational technologies, e.g., learning systems under institutional and other organizational settings. In the educational context, learning systems continuance affects learners' achievement of learning outcomes, especially in fostering reflective practice through sustained and lifelong learning. This thesis addresses the serious problem of negative IS continuance over the long term. Attempts to theorize IS continuance issues have been reported in the literature. IS researchers have proposed different theoretical frameworks and practical guidelines to address IS continuance over the past two decades. Most researchers emphasize users' conscious (e.g., rational and emotional) behavior in order to explain and predict IS continuance behavior. The effect of users' unconscious behavior (e.g., IS habit) on IS continuance, however, has long been understudied, and there is still a paucity of research, as the studies on IS habit mostly present statistical analysis of habitual effects on IS continuance behavior. Attempts to identify and validate antecedents of IS habit have only started recently. There is also a dearth of qualitative research to explore issues related to IS habit formation. To fill the research gaps, the objectives of this thesis are to: (1) identify the antecedents of IS habit, e.g., through IT functionality design and users' peer effect; (2) evaluate the relationships between the IS habit antecedents, IS habit and IS continuance behavior; and (3) propose practical guidelines on aligning learning systems with curriculum design to achieve long term continuance. To fulfill these objectives, a series of two qualitative and quantitative studies designed under the Action Design Research (ADR) methodology to address the theoretical gap on antecedents of IS habit and to ascertain their impacts in the context of learning systems are carried out. Using Automatic Lecture Capturing System (ALCS) and Moodle Learning Management System (LMS) as the case settings in the two studies, the first study identifies student and teacher perceptions on ALCS usefulness, and proposes ways to foster long term continuance technically, pedagogically and institutionally. The second study then seeks empirical evidence to ascertain the impact of two representative findings, i.e., personalized IT applications and peer effects, in developing IS habit. Results suggest that learning systems continuance can be achieved by awareness of a combination of IT artifact extension, better student and teacher motivation, improved teaching and institutional policies facilitating its usage, as well as developed habitual usage. IS habit formation is positively related to availability of personalized IT applications and peer effect. Practically, learning system habits can be fostered through early introduction of peer learning activities that utilize the personalization features. The contributions of this thesis are twofold. Theoretically, the study addresses the gap in how IS habitual behavior can be fostered through different antecedents. Practically, this research is useful to teachers and educational IS designers in educational information systems to develop and apply different system features so to foster users' IS habit in order to maximize the learning system utilization. Notes: CityU Call Number: LB1028.5 .M37 2012; xii, 174 leaves : ill. 30 cm.; Thesis (Ph.D.)--City University of Hong Kong, 2012.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 166-174)

2012-01-01T00:00:00Z Yeh, Pak Fai Colin ( 葉百輝) http://dspace.cityu.edu.hk:80/handle/2031/6491 2012-08-07T07:42:48Z 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Case studies of mobile commerce in Hong Kong and selected Middle Eastern markets : roles and effects of inter-firm information systems on organization form choice Authors: Yeh, Pak Fai Colin ( 葉百輝) Abstract: Mobile penetration has been growing at an exponential rate over the past decade, Mobile services have become an integral part of peoples' daily lives beyond basic communication needs. Consequently, mobile commerce (m-commerce) has become an important phenomenon that is demanding more understanding from both academic scholars and practitioners. Amongst the key stakeholders in the value chain, mobile network operators (MNOs) were the first to lead in the development of m-commerce. NTT-DoCoMo's i-mode was also an early successful example of m-commerce in Japan, representing the case of MNO Portals. Recently, device manufacturers have also been active in launching mobile application stores (App Stores) following the global success of Apple's App Store. Both MNO Portals and App Stroes possess an m-commerce platform (mCom Platform) which is central to both forms of m-commerce deployments. With the research objective of providing researchers and practitioners with further understanding of current m-commerce implementations, a key focus has been placed on the roles and effects of the mCom platform (i.e., the inter-firm IS infrastructure between related m-commerce value chain players). This thesis is conducted within a conceptual model of Organizational Form Choice prediction based on combined theoretical framework of Transaction Cost Economics and Agency Theory. Thus, this thesis proposes two approaches: (1) to adopt a positivist approach deployed to test the predictive conceptual framework of Organization Form Choice prediction based on combined Transaction Cost Economics and Agency Theory, focusing on MNO Portals' and App Stores' implementations within the m-commerce scenarios, and (2) to apply an evaluative and analytical framework based on RBV to investigate the mCom platform as IS resource to provide further insights of current m-commerce scenarios in the market. In particular, to the best knowledge of the researcher of this thesis, no academic work has been conducted on m-commerce using the combined TCE and agency theory framework. This thesis thus contributes to the acamdemic literature by providing aditional theoretical insights with empirical evidence. In summary, this thesis aims to address the following gaps. It first provides further industry insights into MNO Portals and App Stores based on well-developed theories; second, it highlights the importance and impact of the mCom platform as an inter-firm IS resource; third, it applies the combined TCE and agency theory framework to m-commerce; fourth, it tests the theoretical framework with empirical case studies; and finally it provides comparative market insights on the advanced mobile market versus the developing mobile market, with a special focus on the MNO Portals and App Stores phenomenon. Notes: CityU Call Number: HF5548.34 .Y44 2010; ix, 222 leaves : ill. 30 cm.; Thesis (Ph.D.)--City University of Hong Kong, 2010.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 197-216)

2010-01-01T00:00:00Z