A macro model of online information quality perceptions: A review and synthesis of the literature

Online information quality (IQ) plays a critical role in influencing the quality of consumers' experience and decisions in the online environment. Much research has been conducted in the literature to understand the impact of consumers’ perceptions of online IQ on various factors that define the online user experience. This article reviews this existing research and provides a holistic view of this literature culminating in a macro model of online IQ that outlines the current status of research in this area and highlights under-researched areas worthy of future research. Through this comprehensive analysis of 452 articles, we draw several overarching contributions. First, we find that most online IQ research employs an explaining & predicting approach (i.e., explain what is occurring and provide testable predictions with causal relationships) as opposed to a design & action approach (i.e., design tools or frameworks for online IQ assessment). Second, our review reveals that a large proportion of papers have focused on the U.S. and student segments. Third, this review reveals that online IQ research focuses largely on online IQ consequences, with few studies focusing on perceived online IQ antecedents. Based on these findings, we suggest that future studies in this area: (i) Focus more on design &action research; (ii) Use a diversity of sampling populations; and (iii) Focus on the antecedents of the IQ construct as well as moderators for the relations between perceived online IQ and relevant factors.     

Cross-cultural analysis in online community research: A literature review

Cross-cultural online community research can support theoretical generalizability, increase methodological robustness and give insights into user online behavior. The objective of this paper is to review the existing literature on comparative cross-cultural online community research in order to investigate the current state of the literature, extract conceptual patterns and identify methodological and emergent issues. This will inform the development of the field, map out research delimiters, and set out guidelines for future research. The findings from the literature review demonstrated five key areas of methodological difficulty in cross-cultural online community comparative analysis; sampling form, country selection, number of cultures compared, participant type and interpretation of data. Key themes that emerged from the literature included the use of the nation state as a unit of culture, a lack of definition of the concept of online community, and the impact of current theory on cross-cultural online community analyses. Recommendations in the areas of methodology, definition and theory are provided. These findings should be of interest to both specific online community researchers, and those in other multidisciplinary fields where online communities are being used as a research environment.     

1:1 online tuition: a review of the literature from a pedagogical perspective

This paper outlines the findings of a review that examined the literature around current practice in one‐to‐one online tuition in schools and higher education. It summarizes the purposes, contexts, scope, and methods of 17 core studies identified through a systematic literature search. It then uses a conceptual framework focusing on pedagogical innovation to explore the findings of the core studies, a discussion that is also informed by the consideration of a number of contextual studies exploring group online tuition and online learning more generally. The paper concludes by suggesting that the development of one‐to‐one online tuition has been constrained by comparisons with face‐to‐face approaches and that more research is needed to map its characteristics and potential in more detail as technology continues to evolve.     

Key factors for operational performance in manufacturing systems: Conceptual model,systematic literature review and implications

PurposeThe performance of discrete items manufacturing systems (MS) is a primary concern of industrial firms. However, the understanding of the interrelations between performance and its key factors requires further advancements. Thus, several questions remain unanswered in the Operations and Production Management (OPM) field to understand and manage the relationship between these key factors. To address these challenges, this paper conceptualizes and examines the relevant antecedents and essential elements for the design and optimization of competitive MS.Design/methodology/approachFirst, drawing on the consolidated OPM literature, a novel conceptual model was developed incorporating the conceptual relationships essential to MS performance. Second, we conducted a systematic literature review based on the PRISMA protocol to analyze and validate the proposed conceptual model and to indicate the field’s current knowledge gaps and future research directions.FindingsFindings validated the proposed conceptual model by establishing the complex causal interrelations among key factors that influence discrete MS performance. Moreover, we found that the operational performance of discrete MS is multidimensional and directly dependent on the variables and mechanisms associated with the production flow. Findings also demonstrated that the degree of importance of the antecedents of MS performance vary and are temporally interrelated. Lastly, the paper advances the understanding of MS by revealing the predominance of quantitative approaches (e.g., discrete events simulation and closed mathematical models) in the literature as well as an emphasis on describing these approaches rather than characterizing MS appropriately.Research and Practical implicationsThis paper extends our knowledge on the operational performance challenges in discrete MS by proposing a visual, direct, and intuitive conceptual model that enables firms to better comprehend these complex challenges. This research also answers ongoing calls for investigations of the antecedents and elements of competitive MS design and optimization. Our findings show that decision-making in discrete MS is established temporally based on strategic, operational, and control definitions, influencing firms’ operational performance. Finally, since it draws on seminal OPM literature specializing in MS, this study informs scholars, industrial managers, and aid decision-making about discrete MS.Originality/valueThe first original aspect of this study lies in bridging the gaps identified in the OPM literature by providing a robust conceptual framework that highlights the key factors of operational performance in discrete MS. Its second original aspect is that it adopts different information sources in an independent and complementary way to achieve greater generalizability and robustness of the contributions.     

基于贝叶斯网络的在线商品评价质量评估

随着电子商务领域的迅速发展,在线商品评价规模日益庞大,评价质量参差不齐,用户难以筛选有用评价信息做出购买决策,因此如何有效识别高质量评价信息成为重要议题。以在线商品评价的有用性投票为基础定义评价质量,使用贝叶斯网络表示在线商品评价的相似性及不确定性,通过对在线商品评价信息进行多维度特征统计,构建在线商品评价质量评估模型,使用概率推理机制对在线商品评价质量进行分类预测,并给出评价质量分类置信度。在真实数据集上验证模型有效性及高效性。     

The reality of virtual schools: A review of the literature

Virtual schooling was first employed in the mid-1990s and has become a common method of distance education used in K-12 jurisdictions. The most accepted definition of a virtual school is an entity approved by a state or governing body that offers courses through distance delivery – most commonly using the Internet. While virtual schools can be classified in different ways, the three common methods of delivery are by independent, asynchronous or synchronous means. Presently, the vast majority of virtual school students tended to be a select group of academically capable, motivated, independent learners. The benefits associated with virtual schooling are expanding educational access, providing high-quality learning opportunities, improving student outcomes and skills, allowing for educational choice, and achieving administrative efficiency. However, the research to support these conjectures is limited at best. The challenges associated with virtual schooling include the conclusion that the only students typically successful in online learning environments are those who have independent orientations towards learning, highly motivated by intrinsic sources, and have strong time management, literacy, and technology skills. These characteristics are typically associated with adult learners. This stems from the fact that research into and practice of distance education has typically been targeted to adult learners. The problem with this focus is that adults learn differently than younger learners. Researchers are calling for more research into the factors that account for K-12 student success in distance education and virtual school environments and more design research approaches than traditional comparisons of student achievement in traditional and virtual schools.     

基于实时信息的动态应急资源调度模型

为利用实时的道路信息、救援状态信息和应急资源配置信息,以提高应急响应能力,建立了一个动态的应急资源优化调度数学模型.针对任意时刻的静态应急资源调度模型,利用遗传算法进行求解.考虑算法的实时性,通过变换时间变量t进行迭代计算,提出模型的动态求解算法.通过一实例对模型的算法进行了验证分析,结果证明了动态应急资源调度模型及其求解算法的有效性.     

Predicting the use of online information services based on a modified UTAUT model

There is a growing consensus that the conventional technology acceptance model should be modified and expanded to provide a better understanding of the behaviour related to Internet services. Recognising this need, this study re-evaluates the utility of Venkatesh et al.’s [2003. User acceptance of information technology: toward a unified view. MIS Quarterly, 27 (3), 425–478] Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model. First, this study proposes a new modified model of technology acceptance by adding the concepts of trust and flow experience to the original UTAUT model. Second, the study investigates how the model's explanatory power changes for different types of Internet services. For this, this study considers two services – ‘e-learning’ and ‘online gaming’ – for their utilitarian and hedonic characteristics, respectively. The results of this study suggest that the proposed model can better explain behavioural intentions towards Internet services than the original model. The two variables – flow experience and trust – contributed to the overall significance of the model. Furthermore, the type of Internet service moderated the effects of the independent variables on behavioural intentions and use behaviour.     

Navigating digital transformation through an information quality strategy: Evidence from a military organisation

The use of digital technologies for extracting information from various data sources can help organisations to reduce uncertainty and improve decision-making. The increasing availability in volume, velocity, and variety of data, however, can give rise to significant risks and challenges in ensuring a high level of information quality (IQ). Pre-digital organisations can be particularly susceptive to such challenges due to their limited experience with digital technologies and IQ governance. We adopt a theory-infused interventionist research approach to assist a pre-digital multinational military organisation in navigating its digital transformation (DT) by focusing on IQ. We design and implement an IQ strategy (IQS) by drawing upon organisational information processing theory and examining how the level of IQ can affect the balance between information processing requirements and capacity. We demonstrate that an IQS that incorporates both technological, as well as IQ governance solutions, can support organisations in setting the scope of their DT, decreasing employees' resistance to change, and increasing their satisfaction, while concurrently improving organisational efficiency. Our work stresses the importance of IQ in the digital era and delineates how pre-digital organisations can navigate DT by strategically addressing IQ.     

Impact of online word-of-mouth on sales: the moderating role of product review quality

Facing with thousands of online product reviews, consumers usually pay close attention to those valuable ones which provide more specific and credible evaluations on products. Whether a close association exists between product review quality and sales is thus examined in this paper. By employing text mining techniques on multiple review features, a review is measured as one of the following two levels: high-quality or low-quality. In doing so, aggregate quality level of product’s whole reviews is also identified. Then, a two-level econometrical analysis is conducted on the real datasets from Amazon.cn. The results reveal that aggregate quality level of positive reviews and negative reviews interactively influence sales. In the situation the aggregate quality level of positive reviews is high meanwhile that of negative reviews’ is low, product sale is the highest, while in the opposite situation product sale is the lowest. The results also reveal that consumers understand product’s value from weighting positive and negative reviews of high-quality level, which then positively relates to product sales and exerts a dynamic effect on sales by the moderating role of product selling stage and popularity. The paper innovatively integrates the quantitative and qualitative characteristics of reviews to estimate their economic effect.     

User-centred design of neogeography: the impact of volunteered geographic information on users' perceptions of online map ‘mashups’

This paper investigates the influence of presenting volunteered and professionally created geographic information to 101 wheelchair users through an interactive website that included information collected by wheelchair-using volunteers. The aim of this experiment was to understand the influence that (1) knowing a map-based website contains volunteered information and (2) actually including volunteered information within an online interactive map (a mashup) have on the perceived trust of the user, described in terms of quality and authority. Analysis using Kruskal–Wallis showed that judgements of currency were influenced by including geo-information from untrained volunteers (volunteered geographic information) within the mashup, but not influenced by the participant being told that the online map contained volunteered information. The participants appeared to make judgements based on what information they saw, rather than what they were told about the source of the information.     

Past, present and future of mobile payments research: A literature review

The mobile payment services markets are currently under transition with a history of numerous tried and failed solutions, and a future of promising but yet uncertain possibilities with potential new technology innovations. At this point of the development, we take a look at the current state of the mobile payment services market from a literature review perspective. We review prior literature on mobile payments, analyze the various factors that impact mobile payment services markets, and suggest directions for future research in this still emerging field. To facilitate the analysis of literature, we propose a framework of four contingency and five competitive force factors, and organize the mobile payment research under the proposed framework. Consumer perspective of mobile payments as well as technical security and trust are best covered by contemporary research. The impacts of social and cultural factors on mobile payments, as well as comparisons between mobile and traditional payment services are entirely uninvestigated issues. Most of the factors outlined by the framework have been addressed by exploratory and early phase studies.     

Impact of information quality and decision-maker quality on decision quality: a theoretical model and simulation analysis

The impact of information technology (IT) on firm performance is widely studied but little understood. A common perception is that IT improves the quality of information, which, in turn, improves decision quality and performance. Several studies of IT-performance relationship have used managers' perceived as opposed to actual performance. We investigate the impact of information quality and decision-maker quality on actual decision quality using a theoretical and a simulation model. We use accuracy as the measure of quality. Our analysis shows that, depending on the decision-maker quality, decision quality may improve or degrade when information quality improves. The decision quality improves with higher information quality for a decision-maker that has knowledge about the relationships among problem variables. However, the decision quality of a decision-maker that doesn't know these relationships may degrade with higher information quality. Simultaneous improvement in information quality and decision-maker quality results in higher decision quality. The simulation model, which relaxes some of the assumptions made by the theoretical model, yields similar results. We explain how our results supplement the results of prior studies of IT-performance relationship. Our results underscore the need for including decision-maker quality in the investigation of the IT-performance relationship and the importance of developing quality decision support tools.     

A review of the IT outsourcing literature: Insights for practice

This paper reviews research studies of information technology outsourcing (ITO) practice and provides substantial evidence that researchers have meaningfully and significantly addressed the call for academics to produce knowledge relevant to practitioners. Based on a review of 191 IT outsourcing articles, we extract the insights for practice on six key ITO topics relevant to practitioners. The first three topics relate to the early 1990s focus on determinants of IT outsourcing, IT outsourcing strategy, and mitigating IT outsourcing risks. A focus on best practices and client and supplier capabilities developed from the mid-1990s and is traced through to the late 2000s, while relationship management is shown to be a perennial and challenging issue throughout the nearly 20 years under study. More recently studies have developed around offshore outsourcing, business process outsourcing and the rise, decline and resurrection of application service provision. The paper concludes by pointing to future challenges and developments.     

A systematic literature review of studies on business process modeling quality

ContextBusiness process modeling is an essential part of understanding and redesigning the activities that a typical enterprise uses to achieve its business goals. The quality of a business process model has a significant impact on the development of any enterprise and IT support for that process.ObjectiveSince the insights on what constitutes modeling quality are constantly evolving, it is unclear whether research on business process modeling quality already covers all major aspects of modeling quality. Therefore, the objective of this research is to determine the state of the art on business process modeling quality: What aspects of process modeling quality have been addressed until now and which gaps remain to be covered?MethodWe performed a systematic literature review of peer reviewed articles as published between 2000 and August 2013 on business process modeling quality. To analyze the contributions of the papers we use the Formal Concept Analysis technique.ResultsWe found 72 studies addressing quality aspects of business process models. These studies were classified into different dimensions: addressed model quality type, research goal, research method, and type of research result. Our findings suggest that there is no generally accepted framework of model quality types. Most research focuses on empirical and pragmatic quality aspects, specifically with respect to improving the understandability or readability of models. Among the various research methods, experimentation is the most popular one. The results from published research most often take the form of intangible knowledge.ConclusionWe believe there is a lack of an encompassing and generally accepted definition of business process modeling quality. This evidences the need for the development of a broader quality framework capable of dealing with the different aspects of business process modeling quality. Different dimensions of business process quality and of the process of modeling still require further research.     

Definitions and approaches to model quality in model-based software development – A review of literature

More attention is paid to the quality of models along with the growing importance of modelling in software development. We performed a systematic review of studies discussing model quality published since 2000 to identify what model quality means and how it can be improved. From forty studies covered in the review, six model quality goals were identified; i.e., correctness, completeness, consistency, comprehensibility, confinement and changeability. We further present six practices proposed for developing high-quality models together with examples of empirical evidence. The contributions of the article are identifying and classifying definitions of model quality and identifying gaps for future research.     

可扩展的地理信息服务质量综合评价模型研究

随着地理信息服务广泛应用,地理信息服务质量（Quality of Service,QoS）已成为服务应用能否成功的关键因素之一,然而如何合理评价地理信息服务QoS是一个复杂问题。在分析了当前地理信息服务QoS研究成果基础上,以3种不同的视角对地理信息服务QoS进行分类;建立了一种可以扩展QoS属性的综合评价模型,该模型能根据需求定义新的评价因子,并以模糊综合评判的方法量化了QoS的主观评判因子,从而实现了从主观、客观角度全面综合地评价地理信息服务QoS。对地理信息服务质量评价的发展思路和进一步的研究进行了探讨。     

A literature review of electronic marketplace research: Themes, theories and an integrative framework

In this paper, we presented a literature review of the current status of electronic marketplace (EM) research. It consists of 109 journal articles published in 19 journals that are appropriate outlets for electronic commerce research. The results show that an increasing volume of EM research has been conducted from diverse theoretical perspectives. Based on content analysis, we identified eight research themes, five types of methodologies and six categories of background theories which most EM researches were grounded in. By combining research themes and the patterns of the background theories, an integrative framework of EM was proposed to represent the paradigms of EM researches. The framework shows that EM phenomena can be addressed from three perspectives: information systems, inter-organizational/social structure and strategic management perspectives. This framework suggests a parsimonious and cohesive way to explain key EM research issues such as EM adoption, success and impact.

Acceptance of online banking information systems: an empirical case in a developing economy

This paper proposes an extended model of technology acceptance to understand potential users’ acceptance of online banking information systems (OBIS). The proposed model integrates key constructs from information systems and e-commerce acceptance research streams into the theoretical frame of the technology acceptance model. The model was tested on a sample of 353 Internet banking users in Pakistan. Using structural equation modelling with Analysis of Moment Structures software, data analysis showed considerable support for the extended hypothesised model. The results suggested that, in order of importance: perceived usefulness (PU), perceived ease of use (PEOU) and trust explained 45.7% of the variance in intended acceptance behaviour. Trust and technological self-efficacy (TSE) predicted 28.1% of the variance in PU. While in PEOU 21.8% of the variance was predicted by TSE, accessibility and terminology clarity. This study produced valuable insights into the factors that influence acceptance of OBIS by intended users and offers new ideas in understanding the acceptance of technology, especially in developing countries.     

Automated analysis of feature models 20 years later: A literature review

Software product line engineering is about producing a set of related products that share more commonalities than variabilities. Feature models are widely used for variability and commonality management in software product lines. Feature models are information models where a set of products are represented as a set of features in a single model. The automated analysis of feature models deals with the computer-aided extraction of information from feature models. The literature on this topic has contributed with a set of operations, techniques, tools and empirical results which have not been surveyed until now. This paper provides a comprehensive literature review on the automated analysis of feature models 20 years after of their invention. This paper contributes by bringing together previously disparate streams of work to help shed light on this thriving area. We also present a conceptual framework to understand the different proposals as well as categorise future contributions. We finally discuss the different studies and propose some challenges to be faced in the future.