Many online game players spend inordinate amounts of time in their favorite virtual worlds. A large percentage of these players are teenagers who show behaviors normally associated with physical addiction. Parents, educators, and social scientists are therefore saying that online games are sources of social problems. The authors surveyed 174 Taiwanese college-age online players to collect data on the potential effects of online games on the quality of interpersonal relationships and levels of social anxiety. According to the results, the quality of interpersonal relationships decreased and the amount of social anxiety increased as the amount of time spent playing online games increased.
Most past studies assume that computer-mediated communication (CMC) lacks nonverbal communication cues. However, Internet users have devised and learned to use emoticons to assist their communications. This study examined emoticons as a communication tool that, although presented as verbal cues, perform nonverbal communication functions. We therefore termed emoticons quasi-nonverbal cues.
Consumer acceptance of technological innovations is crucial to marketing new products. According to the most influential model in this area, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), perceived usefulness (PU) and perceived ease of use (PEOU) determine users' behavioural intentions to use or purchase a system or product. In the specific context of network externalities, a sense of utility that arises from the number of users (NOU) is considered as important as technology-specific valuation. This study conducted an empirical survey to examine the effects of TAM and network externalities on the acceptance of Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS), an innovation in the field of mobile telecommunications. The results confirm the effectiveness of the TAM and find that network externalities effect affects users' acceptance to this mobile innovations. Accordingly, the TAM can be applied to predict consumer's acceptance to the mobile telecommunication innovations in the presence of network externalities.
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