Belief Decay or Persistence? A Mixed-method Study on Belief Movement Over Time

When individuals encounter new information (data), that information is incorporated with their existing beliefs (prior) to form a new belief (posterior) in a process referred to as belief updating. While most studies on rational belief updating in visual data analysis elicit beliefs immediately after data is shown, we posit that there may be critical movement in an individual's beliefs when elicited immediately after data is shown v. after a temporal delay (e.g., due to forgetfulness or weak incorporation of the data). Our paper investigates the hypothesis that posterior beliefs elicited after a time interval will “decay” back towards the prior beliefs compared to the posterior beliefs elicited immediately after new data is presented. In this study, we recruit 101 participants to complete three tasks where beliefs are elicited immediately after seeing new data and again after a brief distractor task. We conduct (1) a quantitative analysis of the results to understand if there are any systematic differences in beliefs elicited immediately after seeing new data or after a distractor task and (2) a qualitative analysis of participants' reflections on the reasons for their belief update. While we find no statistically significant global trends across the participants beliefs elicited immediately v. after the delay, the qualitative analysis provides rich insight into the reasons for an individual's belief movement across 9 prototypical scenarios, which includes (i) decay of beliefs as a result of either forgetting the information shown or strongly held prior beliefs, (ii) strengthening of confidence in updated beliefs by positively integrating the new data and (iii) maintaining a consistently updated belief over time, among others. These results can guide subsequent experiments to disambiguate when and by what mechanism new data is truly incorporated into one's belief system.     

An empirical investigation of anti-spyware software adoption: A multitheoretical perspective

We performed an empirical investigation of factors affecting an individual's decision to adopt anti-spyware software. Our results suggested that an individual's attitude, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control, and denial of responsibility significantly affected anti-spyware adoption intention. Also, relative advantage and compatibility showed a significant effect on attitude, visibility, and image on subjective norm, and trialability, self-efficacy, and computing capacity on perceived behavioral control. Interestingly, moral obligation, ease of use, and perceived cost were not as significant as was originally expected.     

Design and implementation of a multiagent stock trading system

Stock trading is one of the key items in an economy and estimating its behavior and taking the best decision in it are among the most challenging issues. Solutions based on intelligent agent systems are proposed to cope with those challenges. Agents in a multiagent system (MAS) can share a common goal or they can pursue their own interests. That nature of MASs exactly fits the requirements of a free market economy. Although existing studies include noteworthy proposals on agent‐based market simulation and researchers discuss theoretical design issues of agent‐based stock exchange systems, unfortunately only a very few of the studies consider exact development and implementation of multiagent stock trading systems within the software engineering perspective and guides to the software engineers for constructing such software systems starting from scratch. To fill this gap, in this paper, we discuss the development of a multiagent‐based stock trading system by taking into consideration software design according to a well‐defined agent oriented software engineering methodology and implementation with a widely‐used MAS software development framework. Each participant in the system is first designed as belief–desire–intention agents with their facts, goals, and plans, and then belief–desire–intention reasoning and behavioral structure of the designed agents are implemented. Lessons learned during design and development within the software engineering perspective and evaluation of the implemented multiagent stock exchange system are also reported. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Third Design Space: A postcolonial perspective on corporate engagement with open source software communities

Corporations increasingly engage with open source software communities in the co‐creation of software. This collaboration between corporate professionals and open source software community members is strikingly different from the early days of software development where for‐profit firms attempted to dominate and control the industry while attempting to throttle the success of independent developers offering an alternative, open source option. While many metaphors like trading zones, common pool resources and ecosystems have helped understand the phenomenon, the metaphors do not portray what the industry was like before and after the transition. We adopt a postcolonial metaphor as an analytical lens to examine such collaboration based on qualitative data gathered over three years from executives, managers and developers within corporations that engage in open source software development. Drawing on these insights, we then theorize a “Third Design Space,” based on the concept of the third space proposed by Bhabha. This metaphor encourages the cultivation of a new design environment, creation of new design associations and circulation of shared design resources. Together these practices and behaviours make it possible to nurture innovative methods and new rituals for designing software with results and methods that represent a distinct departure from the competitive and proprietary past, even creating innovative artefacts that could not have been created without the Third Design Space.     

Determinants of intention to deviate from clinical practice guidelines

The volitional nature of procedural violations in work systems creates a challenge for human factors research andpractice. In order to understand how violations are caused and what can be done to mitigate them, there is a need to determine the influence of workers' beliefs about rules and guidelines. This study demonstrates the use of a social psychological approach to investigate the beliefs of anaesthetists about clinical practice guidelines. A survey was completed by 629 consultant anaesthetists, who rated their beliefs about deviation from three guidelines (performing pre-operative visits; checking anaesthetic equipment; handling intravenous fluid bags). Regression analysis indicated that the belief ratings predicted self-rated intention to deviate from the guidelines. Implications for understanding anaesthetists' adherence to guidelines are discussed.

Statement of Relevance: This study builds upon previous work by the authors, presenting a more detailed insight into potential causes of procedural violations in healthcare. The study also demonstrates the use of a social psychological method to the investigation of violations. Hence, it is of interest to researchers and practitioners interested in human reliability, especially in healthcare.     

An empirical study on consumer first purchase intention in online shopping: integrating initial trust and TAM

To understand the first purchase mechanism in online shopping, this study established an integrated model of initial trust and TAM. According to the analysis results, initial trust beliefs were significantly influenced by initial trust bases such as company reputation, structural assurance, and trusting stance, and initial trust beliefs indirectly influenced the first purchase intention through consumer attitude. In TAM constructs, only perceived usefulness directly influenced the usage attitude of online shopping systems, then indirectly influenced the first purchase intention. These results imply that online consumers consider perceived ease of use as a basic requirement for system design. It was also found that there is a time cushion between the time of first purchase and the time of belief formation. On the whole, these results reinforced the theory that a relationship between belief (trust and perceived usefulness) and intention was better explained when it was mediated by attitude.     

Understanding agile software development practices using shared mental models theory

ContextAgile software development is an alternative software development methodology that originated from practice to encourage collaboration between developers and users, to leverage rapid development cycles, and to respond to changes in a dynamic environment. Although agile practices are widely used in organizations, academics call for more theoretical research to understand the value of agile software development methodologies.ObjectiveThis study uses shared mental models theory as a lens to examine practices from agile software methodologies to understand how agile practices enable software development teams to work together to complete tasks and work together effectively as a team.MethodA conceptual analysis of specific agile practices was conducted using the lens of shared mental models theory. Three agile practices from Xtreme Programming and Scrum are examined in detail, system metaphor, stand-up meeting, and on-site customer, using shared mental models theory.ResultsExamining agile practices using shared mental models theory elucidates how agile practices improve collaboration during the software development process. The results explain how agile practices contribute toward a shared understanding and enhanced collaboration within the software development team.ConclusionsThis conceptual analysis demonstrates the value of agile practices in developing shared mental models (i.e. shared understanding) among developers and customers in software development teams. Some agile practices are useful in developing a shared understanding about the tasks to be completed, while other agile practices create shared mental models about team processes and team interactions. To elicit the desired outcomes of agile software development methods, software development teams should consider whether or not agile practices are used in a manner that enhances the team’s shared understanding. Using three specific agile practices as examples, this research demonstrates how theory, such as shared mental models theory, can enhance our understanding regarding how agile practices are useful in enhancing collaboration in the workplace.     

Innovation at work: The relative advantage of using consumer IT in the workplace

Employees' personal devices are increasingly evident in the workplace; the use of non‐enterprise sanctioned hardware and software is now commonplace. This phenomenon, frequently referred to as IT consumerization, is gaining momentum. Employees increasingly are using their own devices and choosing their own software (eg, Google Apps, Skype or Dropbox) in addition to—or instead of—enterprise IT. Employees are turning from consumers of enterprise IT to IT deciders, bypassing the IS department to use what critics call “rogue IT.” While discouraged in some contexts, the influx of consumer IT into the workplace has been suggested to influence innovative behaviours among employees. Although the phenomenon is very prevalent, research lags in the operationalization of an IT consumerization model. In this paper, we take a close look at the antecedents and consequences of consumerization behaviours. We examine to what extent an individual's level of satisfaction with enterprise IT in juxtaposition with the level of perceived relative advantage of consumer IT over enterprise IT influences an individual's usage of consumer IT in the workplace; we also examine how organizational mandates and IT empowerment influences IT consumerization behaviours. Finally, we investigate the influence of IT consumerization on innovative behaviours at work.     

Household technology adoption in a global marketplace: Incorporating the role of espoused cultural values

This paper extends prior research in household technology adoption by incorporating the role of espoused cultural values. Specifically, we theorize that espoused cultural values–individualism/collectivism, masculinity/femininity, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, and long-term orientation—play an important role in affecting consumers’ behaviors by altering consumers’ belief structures—attitudinal beliefs, normative beliefs, and control beliefs. Our theoretical model predicts that the impact of consumers’ belief structures on household technology adoption intention varies across consumers with different cultural values. Propositions are provided to explain how different cultural mechanisms moderate the relationships between consumers’ beliefs and household technology adoption intention. The paper concludes with theoretical implications, future research directions, and practical implications.

Playing seriously – How gamification and social cues influence bank customers to use gamified e-business applications

The development of business applications with game features has given rise to a new trend called gamification and challenged e-banking to introduce new game elements, such as mechanics and social cues, to its traditional applications. Yet, there has been a lack of empirical evidence regarding the intention to use, these type of applications and their possible impacts on business. Here, we explore the role of gamification, socialness, and other four well-known variables (ease-of-use, usefulness, enjoyment, and intention to use) in a gamified business application and corresponding business. We proposed and evaluated a model based on the Technology Acceptance Model to better analyze and understand the adoption of gamified business applications. To test this model, we developed a study using a sample of 183 bank customers, and we found that gamification significantly improved the customer’s sense of social interaction, which, in turn, strongly influenced the customer’s intention to use the applications. We argue that this intention to use could provide a strong benefit to the business, in term of increased customer engagement. This paper presents a new conceptual model to predict behavioral intention in regards to gamification in e-banking, illustrating seven variables that affect the adoption of e-banking by bank customers. Our findings contribute overall to a better understanding of gamification in e-banking (with the extension of Technology Acceptance Model theories, and the new variable gamification), providing important practical implications for software development and marketing practices.     

A Computational Framework for Practical Social Reasoning

This article describes a framework for practical social reasoning designed to be used for analysis, specification, and implementation of the social layer of agent reasoning in multiagent systems. Our framework, called the expectation strategy behavior (ESB) framework, is based on (i) using sets of update rules for social beliefs tied to observations (so‐called expectations), (ii) bounding the amount of reasoning to be performed over these rules by defining a reasoning strategy, and (iii) influencing the agent's decision‐making logic by means of behaviors conditioned on the truth status of current and future social beliefs. We introduce the foundations of ESB conceptually and present a formal framework and an actual implementation of a reasoning engine, which is specifically combined with a general (belief–desire–intention‐based) practical reasoning programming system. We illustrate the generality of ESB through select case studies, which show that it is able to represent and implement different typical styles of social reasoning. The broad coverage of existing social reasoning methods, the modularity that derives from its declarative nature, and its focus on practical implementation make ESB a useful tool for building advanced socially reasoning agents.     

The active components approach for distributed systems development

The development of distributed systems is an intricate task due to inherent characteristics of such systems. In this paper these characteristics are categorised into software engineering, concurrency, distribution and non-functional criteria. Popular classes of distributed systems are classified with respect to these challenges, and it is deduced that modern technological trends lead to the inception of new application classes with increased demands regarding challenges from more than one area. One recent example is the class of ubiquitous computing, which assumes dynamic scenarios in which devices come and go at any time. Furthermore, it is analysed to which extent today's prevailing software development paradigms – object, component, service and agent orientation – are conceptually capable of supporting the challenges. This comparison reveals that each of the paradigms has its own strengths and weaknesses and none addresses all of the challenges. The new active component approach is proposed aiming at a conceptual integration of the existing paradigms in order to tackle all challenges in an intuitive and unified way. The structure, behaviour and composition of active components are explained, and an infrastructure for active components is introduced. To underline the usefulness of the approach real-world applications is presented and an evaluation according to the challenges is given.     

Supporting the development of CAM/DAOP applications: an integrated development process

The increasing complexity of large‐scale distributed applications is driving the Software Engineering community to adopt new software technologies for the development of distributed systems. In this sense, the emergence of component‐based software engineering represents a significant advance towards assembling applications by plugging in pre‐fabricated components. Additionally, the principle of ‘advanced’ separation of concerns is nowadays widely applied to improve modularity, reusability and adaptability of software components. In this way, the aspect‐oriented software development paradigm separates into a new dimension, named aspect, those properties that crosscut the system ‘objects’ or ‘components’, reducing their dependencies. However, the development of software based on the composition of components and aspects is still in its early stages. Part of the reason for this is the lack of well‐defined development processes and tools that help software developers in the use of existing component and aspect‐based approaches. Therefore, the primary aim of this paper is to propose an integrated development process for deriving applications by the assembly of a set of prefabricated components and aspects. This process supports the development of Component‐Aspect Model/Dynamic Aspect‐Oriented Platform (CAM/DAOP) applications, where CAM/DAOP is a new model and platform based on components and aspects. Our intention is to show how, with the support of the integrated development process presented in this paper, it is possible to use CAM/DAOP as an alternative to current distributed platforms. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Methodological Framework for Socio-Cognitive Analyses of Collaborative Design of Open Source Software

Open Source Software (OSS) development challenges traditional software engineering practices. In particular, OSS projects are managed by a large number of volunteers, working freely on the tasks they choose to undertake. OSS projects also rarely rely on explicit system-level design, or on project plans or schedules. Moreover, OSS developers work in arbitrary locations and collaborate almost exclusively over the Internet, using simple tools such as email and software code tracking databases (e.g. CVS).All the characteristics above make OSS development akin to weaving a tapestry of heterogeneous components. The OSS design process relies on various types of actors: people with prescribed roles, but also elements coming from a variety of information spaces (such as email and software code). The objective of our research is to understand the specific hybrid weaving accomplished by the actors of this distributed, collective design process. This, in turn, challenges traditional methodologies used to understand distributed software engineering: OSS development is simply too “fibrous” to lend itself well to analysis under a single methodological lens.In this paper, we describe the methodological framework we articulated to analyze collaborative design in the Open Source world. Our framework focuses on the links between the heterogeneous components of a project’s hybrid network. We combine ethnography, text mining, and socio-technical network analysis and visualization to understand OSS development in its totality. This way, we are able to simultaneously consider the social, technical, and cognitive aspects of OSS development. We describe our methodology in detail, and discuss its implications for future research on distributed collective practices.The order of the co-authors names is not significant.     

Moderating effects of Job Relevance and Experience on mobile wireless technology acceptance: Adoption of a smartphone by individuals

My study extended TAM to include individuals’ intention to use mobile wireless technology (MWT). It added two new constructs, Perceived Cost Savings and Company's Willingness to Fund, and two causal relationships, Job Relevance and Experience, as moderating effects. The 286 sets of data collected in an online survey were tested against the model using SEM. Results supported my new model: the new constructs and variables accounted for 62.7% of the variance found in an individual's behavioral intention to use MWT. The path coefficients between the constructs ranged from 0.26 to 0.85 also supporting the model.     

Tice: A real-time language compilable using C++ compilers

Model-based development (MBD) holds the promise to capture potential timing problems in embedded software during the early phases of the development, securing the production of bug-free embedded software. For most MBD approaches, the source code is just an intermediate artifact that can be generated automatically from the models. This assumption clashes with an undeniable fact: a large share of the commercial embedded software exploits existing libraries or is developed using C/C++ natively. A way to reconcile the ambitions of MBD with the use of a programming language is by offering new language constructs and an innovative compilation tool-chain that prevents model error and timing problems “by construction.” However, the persistent popularity of C/C++ among embedded programmers and the limited availability of tools have severely limited the uptake of alternative programming languages for embedded software. Therefore, we propose an original route. Our language proposal, named Tice, has been shaped as a C++ active library. Tice retains full compatibility with existing C++ code, which can be integrated easily into new Tice-based projects. The enforcement of Tice syntax and semantics can be made by a standard C++ compiler, forgoing the need for new tools. In this article, we describe Tice's syntax, semantics, and model of computation and communication. We demonstrate Tice's practical applicability on an industrial scale use-case and give ample evidence for Tice's efficient compilation using off-the-shelf C++ compilers. Finally, we show Tice's code generation process.     

Attitudes towards software piracy in South Africa: Knowledge of Intellectual Property Laws as a moderator

The aims of the study were to describe the relationship between all three of Kohlberg's levels of moral development and attitudes towards software piracy as well as to determine if an individual's Knowledge of Intellectual Property Laws moderated this relationship. The research exploring moral development and attitudes towards software piracy is limited in that the results are inconclusive and often do not assess higher levels of moral development. In this study, we explore some of the early antecedent relationships in the theory of reasoned action. An exploratory, non-experimental, cross-sectional survey design was used and a questionnaire containing three scales (attitudes towards software piracy, levels of moral development and Knowledge of Intellectual Property Laws) were obtained from a sample of 402 respondents from three medium-sized South African organisations and from an online survey on a prominent South African online information technology magazine. The results indicated that there is a significant positive relationship between the respondents’ attitudes to software piracy and levels of moral development. Additionally, there are significant relationships between attitudes towards software piracy and each of the levels of moral development. Level 2 moral development predicted the most amount of variance in attitudes towards software piracy. The moderated multiple linear regression revealed that the Knowledge of Intellectual Property Laws did not have a moderating effect on the relationship between attitudes towards software piracy and moral development. These findings provide a more in-depth analysis of the relationship between attitudes and levels of moral development with respect to software piracy.     

Process-Based Software Engineering: Building the Infrastructures

A recent trend in software engineering is the shift from a focus on laboratory-oriented software engineering to a more industry-oriented view of software engineering processes. This complements preceding ideas about software engineering in terms of organization and process-orientation. From the domain coverage point of view, many of the existing software engineering approaches have mainly concentrated on the technical aspects of software development. Important areas of software engineering, such as the technical and organizational infrastructures, have been left untouched. As software systems increase in scales, issues of complexity and professional practices become involved. Software development as an academic or laboratory activity, has to engage with software development as a key industrialized process.This expanded domain of software engineering exposes the limitations of existing methodologies that often address only individual subdomains. There is, therefore, a demand for an overarching approach that provide a basis for theoretical and practical infrastructures capable of accommodating the whole range of modern software engineering practices and requirements. One approach is provided by Process-Based Software Engineering (PBSE); part of the more general trend towards a focus on process.This paper provides a review of process techniques for software engineering and a high-level perspective on PBSE. Typical approaches and techniques for the establishment, assessment, improvement and benchmarking of software engineering process systems are introduced in this paper, and many are developed further in other contributions to this volume.     

Exploring principles of user-centered agile software development: A literature review

ContextIn the last decade, software development has been characterized by two major approaches: agile software development, which aims to achieve increased velocity and flexibility during the development process, and user-centered design, which places the goals and needs of the system’s end-users at the center of software development in order to deliver software with appropriate usability. Hybrid development models, referred to as user-centered agile software development (UCASD) in this article, propose to combine the merits of both approaches in order to design software that is both useful and usable.ObjectiveThis paper aims to capture the current state of the art in UCASD approaches and to derive generic principles from these approaches. More specifically, we investigate the following research question: Which principles constitute a user-centered agile software development approach?MethodWe conduct a systematic review of the literature on UCASD. Identified works are analyzed using a coding scheme that differentiates four levels of UCASD: the process, practices, people/social and technology dimensions. Through subsequent synthesis, we derive generic principles of UCASD.ResultsWe identified and analyzed 83 relevant publications. The analysis resulted in a comprehensive coding system and five principles for UCASD: (1) separate product discovery and product creation, (2) iterative and incremental design and development, (3) parallel interwoven creation tracks, (4) continuous stakeholder involvement, and (5) artifact-mediated communication.ConclusionOur paper contributes to the software development body of knowledge by (1) providing a broad overview of existing works in the area of UCASD, (2) deriving an analysis framework (in form a coding system) for works in this area, going beyond former classifications, and (3) identifying generic principles of UCASD and associating them with specific practices and processes.