Online communities deserve better than their current treatment---where they are largely relegated to the fringes of health care.
In this paper the authors examine the various models in the medical domain and the communities that proliferate around these web models. Given that several of these business models have failed. while others continue to exist, it is argued that the key is to understand the individual consumer motivators and inhibitors for such knowledge. In this paper the authors systematically develop a theoretical model to understand such motivators and inhibitors of individuals' obtaining health related information online. The focus of this study is the manner in which individual consumers' use online sources to obtain health and other related medical information.
Organizational downsizing research indicates that downsizing does not always realize its strategic intent and may, in fact, have a detrimental impact on organizational performance. In this paper, we extend the notion that downsizing negatively impacts performance and argue that organizational downsizing can potentially be detrimental to software quality performance. Using social cognitive theory (SCT), we primarily interpret the negative impacts of downsizing on software quality performance by arguing that downsizing results in a realignment of social networks (environmental factors), thereby affecting the self-efficacy and outcome expectations of a software professional (personal factors), which, in turn, affect software quality performance (outcome of behaviour undertaken). We synthesize relevant literature from the software quality, SCT and downsizing research streams and develop a conceptual model. Two major impacts of downsizing are hypothesized in the conceptual model. First, downsizing destroys formal and informal social networks in organizations, which, in turn, negatively impacts software developers' self-efficacy and outcome expectations through their antecedents, with consequent negative impacts on software development process efficiency and software product quality, the two major components of software quality performance. Second, downsizing negatively affects antecedents of software development process efficiency, namely top management leadership, management infrastructure sophistication, process management efficacy and stakeholder participation with consequent negative impacts on software quality performance. This theoretically grounded discourse can help demonstrate how organizational downsizing can potentially impact software quality performance through key intervening constructs. We also discuss how downsizing and other intervening constructs can be managed to mitigate the negative impacts of downsizing on software quality performance. estimates that an inadequate infrastructure for software testing costs the national economy $59.5 billion annually (Tassey, 2002). The NIST further estimates that with feasible infrastructure improvements, this can be reduced by $22.2 billion, leaving about $37.3 billion in costs to the economy on account of inadequate software testing. Organizational factors such as software developer and end-user issues, rather than technical issues, account for a large portion of these remaining costs (Tassey, 2002). Inadequate software testing infrastructure hinders the detection and correction of bugs, consequently affecting software quality performance. Our reference to software quality performance includes both software product quality as evidenced in terms of product characteristics such as functionality and reliability, and software development process quality as evidenced in process efficiencies, in line with the organizational perspective on software quality performance (Ravichandran & Rai, 2000). The cost to the economy is hence on account of software failing to meet qu...
Purpose This study aims to address the following questions: What is enduring about consumer behavior on social media given that digital and social media (DSM) technologies change rapidly? Why do millennials use social media to the extent they do? The authors’ review revealed that a prevailing theoretical approach that may help answer these questions is inadequate. The technology acceptance model (TAM) from information systems was grafted into marketing to explain consumer technology adoption. TAM predicts Facebook adoption effectively, as demonstrated in the authors’ first study, but does not go beyond that in explaining the why’s behind its use. In a second study, the authors used the means-end approach (MEC) complementarily to unearth the why’s of millennials’ use of Facebook. Design/methodology/approach The authors used a mixed-methods design combining the structural modeling of TAM with the probing one-on-one interviews and laddering of MEC. Findings The authors found that the laddering process both widened and deepened TAM’s scope. It not only confirmed the importance of the TAM attributes, perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness, but it also revealed others, in determining adoption. It was also able to dig deeper from these to uncover a mesh of fundamental values that millennials used Facebook to satisfy, such as belongingness, pleasure, social acceptance and inner harmony, in their quest for inner and relational contentment. The authors also found negative aspects that kept consumers away, such as its lack of privacy and the overwhelming nature of unwanted video in its feed, tying these back to important values. Research limitations/implications The authors build on prior exploratory work relating to DSM use and uncover psychological drivers of consumer behavior on social media, by blending TAM in a consumer context, and the MEC approach. The TAM-MEC framework used here offers a technology-independent template for other DSM research, by focusing on how and why consumers use media socially. Practical implications Managerially, the authors discuss the building of sustainable marketing strategy on enduring consumer values rather than on transient attributes or technologies. The authors also discuss potential areas of vulnerability for Facebook, such as its increasing use of video and live content, which creates negative consumer sentiment and which may drive consumers to competitors. Originality/value By blending the quantitative TAM and the qualitative MEC, something that has not been done before in marketing, this research provides trustworthy answers to the research questions. In so doing, this study also contributes some cohesion to the fragmented DSM research field, as called for recently in prominent journals, by anchoring DSM study in well-established theories in marketing.
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