Technology in Society最新文献

Digital transition to Industry 5.0 (I5.0) has finally arrived after Industry 4.0 (I4.0) was offered ten years ago to help address industry flaws in manufacturing. I5.0 is necessary in contemporary business to achieve competitive advantages for a sustainable future. However, despite the importance of I5.0, the critical success factors (CSFs) for the transition from I4.0 to I5.0 have not been explored extensively in the literature. This study develops a model to investigate potential CSFs for the smooth transition from I4.0 to I5.0. The study ensures systems flexibility, then ranks the identified CSFs based on their influential weights and explores their interrelationships. The study adopts the Bayesian best-worst method (B-BWM) to assess the perceptions of several decision-makers from a probabilistic perspective for reducing information loss. The results from this study reflect that CSFs, such as adoption of advanced technology to create value in I5.0 paradigm, high-powered analytical ability for smart manufacturing, cost and funding in transition from I4.0 to I5.0, aligned organizational strategy in transition to I5.0, and security and privacy to ensure effective digital transformation, contribute significantly towards the digital transformation from I4.0 to I.50 in smart manufacturing in the context of steel manufacturing business environment considering the developing countries. The successful implementation of CSFs can help achieve flexibility in the supply chain, contribute to flexible systems and support managers in framing strategies that help them prioritize for an easy transition towards a sustainable future.

Recent papers assume that whereas the value of ‘traditional’ communications networks follows Metcalfe's law – that is, grows with the square of the number of users – the value of group-forming network platforms should increase faster. The papers see evidence in the fact that the advertising revenues of platforms such as Facebook and Tencent follow a cube law or stronger. We argue that such tests do not make much sense, as they lack a theoretical justification. Growth laws such as Metcalfe's and Reed's were conceived with purely one-sided networks in mind, reason in terms of utility for users, and have little to say about the monetisation of the value created. The results of the very papers that we discuss show that the laws have no generality. We also provide a counterexample of our own and proffer an alternative explanation.

Addressing public safety effectively requires incorporating diverse stakeholder perspectives, particularly those of the community, which are often underrepresented compared to other stakeholders. This study presents a comprehensive analysis of the community's general public safety concerns, their view of existing surveillance technologies, and their perception of AI-driven solutions for enhancing safety in urban environments, focusing on Charlotte, NC. Through a survey approach, including in-person surveys conducted in August and September 2023 with 410 participants, this research investigates demographic factors such as age, gender, ethnicity, and educational level to gain insights into public perception and concerns toward public safety and possible solutions. Based on the type of dependent variables, we utilized different statistical and significance analyses, such as logit regression and ordinal logistic regression, to explore the effects of demographic factors on the various dependent variables. Our results reveal demographic differences in public safety concerns. Younger females tend to feel less secure yet trust existing video surveillance systems, whereas older, educated individuals are more concerned about violent crimes in malls. Additionally, attitudes towards AI-driven surveillance differ: older Black individuals demonstrate support for it despite having concerns about data privacy, while educated females show a tendency towards skepticism.

The manufacturing sector attributes the growing prominence of Drones and the Internet of Drones (IoD) systems to their multifaceted utility in delivery, process monitoring, infrastructure inspection, inventory management, predictive maintenance, and safety inspections. Despite their potential benefits, adopting these technologies faces significant obstacles that need systematic identification and resolution. The current literature inadequately addresses the barriers impeding the adoption of Drones and IoD systems in manufacturing, indicating a research gap. This study bridges this gap by providing comprehensive insights and facilitating the organisational transition towards embracing Drone and IoD technologies. This research identifies 20 critical barriers to deploying Drones and IoD in manufacturing. These barriers are validated through a global quantitative survey of 120 Drone experts and analyzed via Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA). EFA categorises these challenges into six distinct dimensions. Utilizing the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP), these dimensions and individual barriers are ranked, incorporating feedback from five Drone specialists. The study highlights ‘Safety and Human Resource Barriers’ and ‘Payload Capacity and Battery Barriers’ as the most predominant obstacles. Key concerns include limited battery life, explosion risks, and potential damage to assets and individuals. This research significantly advances the existing literature by presenting a practical methodology for categorising and prioritising Drone and IoD adoption barriers. Employing EFA and AHP offers a globally relevant framework for stakeholders to strategically address these challenges, advancing the integration of drones and IoD systems in the manufacturing domain.

Although, the growing insights of innovativeness, customer-brand-identification (CBI), or value co-creation (VCC) in destination/tourism and health service-contexts, limited remains recognized regarding the interface of these and related factors in luxury hotel-brand-contexts. Drawing on service-dominant-logic and social-identity-theory informed perspectives; we suggest and test a model that investigates the interface between firm-innovativeness (FIN), customer-innovativeness (CIN), CBI, VCC, customer-satisfaction and happiness with luxury-hotel-brands. A sample of 326 hotel-customers was analyzed by deploying PSL-SEM-based transmittal-mediation-analysis. Findings first exposed that FIN have a significant/positive effect on VCC and CBI. Second, our results corroborated CBI's positive impact on VCC. Third, results uncovered CIN's significant influence on VCC and CBI. Fourth, findings discovered VCC's positive influence on satisfaction and happiness. Finally, findings showed FIN's, CBI's, and CIN's indirect effect on satisfaction and happiness mediated through VCC. The study contributes existing-knowledge and facilitates hotel-marketers to best stimulate firm/customer innovativeness-based VCC, satisfaction and happiness, thus offers important implications.

The main purpose of this study is to develop and empirically examine an integrated theoretical model to understand the relationship between Startups' livestreaming (SLS) efforts and firm performance, with a particular emphasis on the mediating role of customers' investment and the moderating role of SLS experience. This may be one of the pioneer studies in this field that demonstrates company performances with firm-level information. The research model was developed with the stimulus-organism-response (SOR) theory as its foundation, after collecting data from a useable sample of 289 respondents, comprising of business founders, managers, employees, and vloggers across several startup industries, the research hypotheses were tested using AMOS (version 24), a program for conducting structural equation modeling (SEM). The study results showed a direct association of SLS efforts with all of its endogenous variables, i.e., SLS adoption, consumer investment, and firm performance. Furthermore, consumer investment fully mediates the relationship between SLS adoption and firm performance. SLS experience noticeably moderates all of our study model's anticipated pathways. Based on the study's findings, some significant theoretical advancements and entrepreneurial ramifications have been identified. The report finishes by identifying its shortcomings and ideas for future research.

This paper presents pioneering evidence of the effects of various novel technologies on migrant employment. By analysing data from 18 EU member states from 2005 to 2019, it sheds light on how innovations proxied by patents granted, robot adoption, three categories of digital assets, and total factor productivity, affect migrant employment. The key findings reveal that innovation leads to an increase in both the number and proportion of migrant workers relative to the overall workforce. While robots do displace some workers, their impact on native workers is stronger compared to migrant workers. Total factor productivity positively influences migrant workers, while the effects of digital assets are heterogeneous. Importantly, results also point towards significant variations concerning the impacts of these technologies on migrant workers across different occupations and educational levels.

Artificial intelligence-assisted diagnostic systems (AIADS) signify a significant medical revolution, reducing environmental burdens and enabling AI-based medical services to catalyze sustainability-oriented positive change. Because users demonstrate almost contradictory attitudes or resistance to adopting medical information provided by AIADS, controversy persists regarding the use of the technology. Based on behavioral reasoning theory (BRT), this study adds empirical insights into the significant influence of users' values (openness to change) toward reasons (for and against) and their intentions to adopt AIADS from the perspective of behavioral reasoning. A scenario questionnaire survey of 604 Chinese users demonstrated that openness to change significantly impacts users' attitudes and reasons (for and against) adopting AIADS. A dual pathway explains the reasons for and against adopting AIADS. The findings contribute to BRT's application in AI-assisted medical service and provide implications to practitioners that will increase users' adoption of AIADS.

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has transformed the way people communicate, interact, and use information for growth. This study uses a three-year panel of 91 countries to examine how mobile phones as ICT affect economic growth directly through the communication and information channel, and indirectly through the FinTech and financial inclusion channel. We derive these effects of mobile phones using the Structural Equation Modeling approach, controlling for time-invariant heterogeneity at the country level. The results are then compared with the estimates using the commonly adopted stepwise fixed-effects regressions. The results indicate that the direct effect of mobile phones is more pronounced than the indirect effect. Although mobile phones promote FinTech applications for payments and savings, expanded mobile phone coverage is negatively associated with financial inclusion in terms of formal credit. In contrast to the majority of empirical evidence showing limited impacts on developing Sub-Saharan Africa, we consistently document greater impacts on this region, suggesting greater benefits to be achieved from ICT investments. Our results remain robust across different measurements of financial inclusion and estimation methods.

In recent years, with the growth of social networks such as Instagram, network influencers and micro-celebrities with a mass audience of followers have begun to emerge. Corporations and companies supposedly use through these influencers to create a more direct connection with consumers through the “daily lives” of followers.

The aim of this study was to compare the differences in the activities and perceptions of secular and religious “lifestyle” network influencers and to determine whether Instagram preserves social roles. The current study is based on an integrated quantitative and qualitative research method. First, we analyzed the Instagram pages of 61 influencers (27 religious and 34 secular influencers) and then conducted semi-structured in-depth interviews with twenty influencers, half of whom were secular and half were religious. The main finding regarding differences between secular and religious influencers indicates that secular influencers exploit female sexuality and stereotypes, whereas religious influencers are less exposed to and do not exploit their femininity. Through the prism of symbolic interactionism theory, this study argues that micro-celebrities may maintain the social roles that society expects them to present. The study also suggests that collaborations with corporations serve to promote consumerism and corporate interests.