• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.111-124
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• 2018

This study aims to develop a classification model for predicting the occurrence of hyperlipidemia, one of the chronic diseases. Prior studies applying data mining techniques for predicting disease can be classified into a model design study for predicting cardiovascular disease and a study comparing disease prediction research results. In the case of foreign literatures, studies predicting cardiovascular disease were predominant in predicting disease using data mining techniques. Although domestic studies were not much different from those of foreign countries, studies focusing on hypertension and diabetes were mainly conducted. Since hypertension and diabetes as well as chronic diseases, hyperlipidemia, are also of high importance, this study selected hyperlipidemia as the disease to be analyzed. We also developed a model for predicting hyperlipidemia using SVM and meta learning algorithms, which are already known to have excellent predictive power. In order to achieve the purpose of this study, we used data set from Korea Health Panel 2012. The Korean Health Panel produces basic data on the level of health expenditure, health level and health behavior, and has conducted an annual survey since 2008. In this study, 1,088 patients with hyperlipidemia were randomly selected from the hospitalized, outpatient, emergency, and chronic disease data of the Korean Health Panel in 2012, and 1,088 nonpatients were also randomly extracted. A total of 2,176 people were selected for the study. Three methods were used to select input variables for predicting hyperlipidemia. First, stepwise method was performed using logistic regression. Among the 17 variables, the categorical variables(except for length of smoking) are expressed as dummy variables, which are assumed to be separate variables on the basis of the reference group, and these variables were analyzed. Six variables (age, BMI, education level, marital status, smoking status, gender) excluding income level and smoking period were selected based on significance level 0.1. Second, C4.5 as a decision tree algorithm is used. The significant input variables were age, smoking status, and education level. Finally, C4.5 as a decision tree algorithm is used. In SVM, the input variables selected by genetic algorithms consisted of 6 variables such as age, marital status, education level, economic activity, smoking period, and physical activity status, and the input variables selected by genetic algorithms in artificial neural network consist of 3 variables such as age, marital status, and education level. Based on the selected parameters, we compared SVM, meta learning algorithm and other prediction models for hyperlipidemia patients, and compared the classification performances using TP rate and precision. The main results of the analysis are as follows. First, the accuracy of the SVM was 88.4% and the accuracy of the artificial neural network was 86.7%. Second, the accuracy of classification models using the selected input variables through stepwise method was slightly higher than that of classification models using the whole variables. Third, the precision of artificial neural network was higher than that of SVM when only three variables as input variables were selected by decision trees. As a result of classification models based on the input variables selected through the genetic algorithm, classification accuracy of SVM was 88.5% and that of artificial neural network was 87.9%. Finally, this study indicated that stacking as the meta learning algorithm proposed in this study, has the best performance when it uses the predicted outputs of SVM and MLP as input variables of SVM, which is a meta classifier. The purpose of this study was to predict hyperlipidemia, one of the representative chronic diseases. To do this, we used SVM and meta-learning algorithms, which is known to have high accuracy. As a result, the accuracy of classification of hyperlipidemia in the stacking as a meta learner was higher than other meta-learning algorithms. However, the predictive performance of the meta-learning algorithm proposed in this study is the same as that of SVM with the best performance (88.6%) among the single models. The limitations of this study are as follows. First, various variable selection methods were tried, but most variables used in the study were categorical dummy variables. In the case with a large number of categorical variables, the results may be different if continuous variables are used because the model can be better suited to categorical variables such as decision trees than general models such as neural networks. Despite these limitations, this study has significance in predicting hyperlipidemia with hybrid models such as met learning algorithms which have not been studied previously. It can be said that the result of improving the model accuracy by applying various variable selection techniques is meaningful. In addition, it is expected that our proposed model will be effective for the prevention and management of hyperlipidemia.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.27-55
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• 2008

Due to the increasing and intensifying competition in the Internet shopping market, it has been recognized as very important to develop an effective policy and strategy for acquiring loyal customers. For this reason, web site designers need to know if a new Internet shopping mall(ISM) will be accepted. Researchers have been working on identifying factors for explaining and predicting user acceptance of an ISM. Some studies, however, revealed inconsistent findings on the antecedents of user acceptance of a website. Lack of consideration for individual differences in user ability is believed to be one of the key reasons for the mixed findings. The elaboration likelihood model (ELM) and several studies have suggested that individual differences in ability plays an moderating role on the relationship between the antecedents and user acceptance. Despite the critical role of user ability, little research has examined the role of user ability in the Internet shopping mall context. The purpose of this study is to develop a user acceptance model that consider the moderating role of user ability in the context of Internet shopping. This study was initiated to see the ability of the technology acceptance model(TAM) to explain the acceptance of a specific ISM. According to TAM. which is one of the most influential models for explaining user acceptance of IT, an intention to use IT is determined by usefulness and ease of use. Given that interaction between user and website takes place through web interface, the decisions to accept and continue using an ISM depend on these beliefs. However, TAM neglects to consider the fact that many users would not stick to an ISM until they trust it although they may think it useful and easy to use. The importance of trust for user acceptance of ISM has been raised by the relational views. The relational view emphasizes the trust-building process between the user and ISM, and user's trust on the website is a major determinant of user acceptance. The proposed model extends and integrates the TAM and relational views on user acceptance of ISM by incorporating usefulness, ease of use, and trust. User acceptance is defined as a user's intention to reuse a specific ISM. And user ability is introduced into the model as moderating variable. Here, the user ability is defined as a degree of experiences, knowledge and skills regarding Internet shopping sites. The research model proposes that the ease of use, usefulness and trust of ISM are key determinants of user acceptance. In addition, this paper hypothesizes that the effects of the antecedents(i.e., ease of use, usefulness, and trust) on user acceptance may differ among users. In particular, this paper proposes a moderating effect of a user's ability on the relationship between antecedents with user's intention to reuse. The research model with eleven hypotheses was derived and tested through a survey that involved 470 university students. For each research variable, this paper used measurement items recognized for reliability and widely used in previous research. We slightly modified some items proper to the research context. The reliability and validity of the research variables were tested using the Crobnach's alpha and internal consistency reliability (ICR) values, standard factor loadings of the confirmative factor analysis, and average variance extracted (AVE) values. A LISREL method was used to test the suitability of the research model and its relating six hypotheses. Key findings of the results are summarized in the following. First, TAM's two constructs, ease of use and usefulness directly affect user acceptance. In addition, ease of use indirectly influences user acceptance by affecting trust. This implies that users tend to trust a shopping site and visit repeatedly when they perceive a specific ISM easy to use. Accordingly, designing a shopping site that allows users to navigate with heuristic and minimal clicks for finding information and products within the site is important for improving the site's trust and acceptance. Usefulness, however, was not found to influence trust. Second, among the three belief constructs(ease of use, usefulness, and trust), trust was empirically supported as the most important determinants of user acceptance. This implies that users require trustworthiness from an Internet shopping site to be repeat visitors of an ISM. Providing a sense of safety and eliminating the anxiety of online shoppers in relation to privacy, security, delivery, and product returns are critically important conditions for acquiring repeat visitors. Hence, in addition to usefulness and ease of use as in TAM, trust should be a fundamental determinants of user acceptance in the context of internet shopping. Third, the user's ability on using an Internet shopping site played a moderating role. For users with low ability, ease of use was found to be a more important factors in deciding to reuse the shopping mall, whereas usefulness and trust had more effects on users with high ability. Applying the EML theory to these findings, we can suggest that experienced and knowledgeable ISM users tend to elaborate on such usefulness aspects as efficient and effective shopping performance and trust factors as ability, benevolence, integrity, and predictability of a shopping site before they become repeat visitors of the site. In contrast, novice users tend to rely on the low elaborating features, such as the perceived ease of use. The existence of moderating effects suggests the fact that different individuals evaluate an ISM from different perspectives. The expert users are more interested in the outcome of the visit(usefulness) and trustworthiness(trust) than those novice visitors. The latter evaluate the ISM in a more superficial manner focusing on the novelty of the site and on other instrumental beliefs(ease of use). This is consistent with the insights proposed by the Heuristic-Systematic model. According to the Heuristic-Systematic model. a users act on the principle of minimum effort. Thus, the user considers an ISM heuristically, focusing on those aspects that are easy to process and evaluate(ease of use). When the user has sufficient experience and skills, the user will change to systematic processing, where they will evaluate more complex aspects of the site(its usefulness and trustworthiness). This implies that an ISM has to provide a minimum level of ease of use to make it possible for a user to evaluate its usefulness and trustworthiness. Ease of use is a necessary but not sufficient condition for the acceptance and use of an ISM. Overall, the empirical results generally support the proposed model and identify the moderating effect of the effects of user ability. More detailed interpretations and implications of the findings are discussed. The limitations of this study are also discussed to provide directions for future research.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.57-79
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• 2016

It is a rising trend that the number of users using one of the social media channels, the Social Network Service, so called the SNS, is getting increased. As per to this social trend, more companies have interest in this networking platform and start to invest their funds in it. It has received much attention as a tool spreading and expanding the message that a company wants to deliver to its customers and has been recognized as an important channel in terms of the relationship marketing with them. The environment of media that is radically changing these days makes possible for companies to approach their customers in various ways. Particularly, the social network service, which has been developed rapidly, provides the environment that customers can freely talk about products. For companies, it also works as a channel that gives customized information to customers. To succeed in the online environment, companies need to not only build the relationship between companies and customers but focus on the relationship between customers as well. In response to the online environment with the continuous development of technology, companies have tirelessly made the novel marketing strategy. Especially, as the one-to-one marketing to customers become available, it is more important for companies to maintain the relationship marketing with their customers. Among many SNS, Facebook, which many companies use as a communication channel, provides a fan page service for each company that supports its business. Facebook fan page is the platform that the event, information and announcement can be shared with customers using texts, videos, and pictures. Companies open their own fan pages in order to inform their companies and businesses. Such page functions as the websites of companies and has a characteristic of their brand communities such as blogs as well. As Facebook has become the major communication medium with customers, companies recognize its importance as the effective marketing channel, but they still need to investigate their business performances by using Facebook. Although there are infinite potentials in Facebook fan page that even has a function as a community between users, which other platforms do not, it is incomplete to regard companies' Facebook fan pages as communities and analyze them. In this study, it explores the relationship among customers through the network of the Facebook fan page users. The previous studies on a company's Facebook fan page were focused on finding out the effective operational direction by analyzing the use state of the company. However, in this study, it draws out the structural variable of the network, which customer committment can be measured by applying the social network analysis methodology and investigates the influence of the structural characteristics of network on the business performance of companies in an empirical way. Through each company's Facebook fan page, the network of users who engaged in the communication with each company is exploited and it is the one-mode undirected binary network that respectively regards users and the relationship of them in terms of their marketing activities as the node and link. In this network, it draws out the structural variable of network that can explain the customer commitment, who pressed "like," made comments and shared the Facebook marketing message, of each company by calculating density, global clustering coefficient, mean geodesic distance, diameter. By exploiting companies' historical performance such as net income and Tobin's Q indicator as the result variables, this study investigates influence on companies' business performances. For this purpose, it collects the network data on the subjects of 54 companies among KOSPI-listed companies, which have posted more than 100 articles on their Facebook fan pages during the data collection period. Then it draws out the network indicator of each company. The indicator related to companies' performances is calculated, based on the posted value on DART website of the Financial Supervisory Service. From the academic perspective, this study suggests a new approach through the social network analysis methodology to researchers who attempt to study the business-purpose utilization of the social media channel. From the practical perspective, this study proposes the more substantive marketing performance measurements to companies performing marketing activities through the social media and it is expected that it will bring a foundation of establishing smart business strategies by using the network indicators.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.1-32
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• 2018

In addition to stakeholders including managers, employees, creditors, and investors of bankrupt companies, corporate defaults have a ripple effect on the local and national economy. Before the Asian financial crisis, the Korean government only analyzed SMEs and tried to improve the forecasting power of a default prediction model, rather than developing various corporate default models. As a result, even large corporations called 'chaebol enterprises' become bankrupt. Even after that, the analysis of past corporate defaults has been focused on specific variables, and when the government restructured immediately after the global financial crisis, they only focused on certain main variables such as 'debt ratio'. A multifaceted study of corporate default prediction models is essential to ensure diverse interests, to avoid situations like the 'Lehman Brothers Case' of the global financial crisis, to avoid total collapse in a single moment. The key variables used in corporate defaults vary over time. This is confirmed by Beaver (1967, 1968) and Altman's (1968) analysis that Deakins'(1972) study shows that the major factors affecting corporate failure have changed. In Grice's (2001) study, the importance of predictive variables was also found through Zmijewski's (1984) and Ohlson's (1980) models. However, the studies that have been carried out in the past use static models. Most of them do not consider the changes that occur in the course of time. Therefore, in order to construct consistent prediction models, it is necessary to compensate the time-dependent bias by means of a time series analysis algorithm reflecting dynamic change. Based on the global financial crisis, which has had a significant impact on Korea, this study is conducted using 10 years of annual corporate data from 2000 to 2009. Data are divided into training data, validation data, and test data respectively, and are divided into 7, 2, and 1 years respectively. In order to construct a consistent bankruptcy model in the flow of time change, we first train a time series deep learning algorithm model using the data before the financial crisis (2000~2006). The parameter tuning of the existing model and the deep learning time series algorithm is conducted with validation data including the financial crisis period (2007~2008). As a result, we construct a model that shows similar pattern to the results of the learning data and shows excellent prediction power. After that, each bankruptcy prediction model is restructured by integrating the learning data and validation data again (2000 ~ 2008), applying the optimal parameters as in the previous validation. Finally, each corporate default prediction model is evaluated and compared using test data (2009) based on the trained models over nine years. Then, the usefulness of the corporate default prediction model based on the deep learning time series algorithm is proved. In addition, by adding the Lasso regression analysis to the existing methods (multiple discriminant analysis, logit model) which select the variables, it is proved that the deep learning time series algorithm model based on the three bundles of variables is useful for robust corporate default prediction. The definition of bankruptcy used is the same as that of Lee (2015). Independent variables include financial information such as financial ratios used in previous studies. Multivariate discriminant analysis, logit model, and Lasso regression model are used to select the optimal variable group. The influence of the Multivariate discriminant analysis model proposed by Altman (1968), the Logit model proposed by Ohlson (1980), the non-time series machine learning algorithms, and the deep learning time series algorithms are compared. In the case of corporate data, there are limitations of 'nonlinear variables', 'multi-collinearity' of variables, and 'lack of data'. While the logit model is nonlinear, the Lasso regression model solves the multi-collinearity problem, and the deep learning time series algorithm using the variable data generation method complements the lack of data. Big Data Technology, a leading technology in the future, is moving from simple human analysis, to automated AI analysis, and finally towards future intertwined AI applications. Although the study of the corporate default prediction model using the time series algorithm is still in its early stages, deep learning algorithm is much faster than regression analysis at corporate default prediction modeling. Also, it is more effective on prediction power. Through the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the current government and other overseas governments are working hard to integrate the system in everyday life of their nation and society. Yet the field of deep learning time series research for the financial industry is still insufficient. This is an initial study on deep learning time series algorithm analysis of corporate defaults. Therefore it is hoped that it will be used as a comparative analysis data for non-specialists who start a study combining financial data and deep learning time series algorithm.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.211-232
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• 2014

Recently, there is a growing interest toward social commerce using SNS(Social Networking Service), and the size of its market is also expanding due to popularization of smart phones, tablet PCs and other smart devices. Accordingly, various studies have been attempted but it is shown that most of the previous studies have been conducted from perspectives of the users. The purpose of this study is to derive user-centered CSF(Critical Success Factor) of social commerce from the previous studies and analyze the CSF perception gap between social commerce service providers and users. The CSF perception gap between two groups shows that there is a difference between ideal images the service providers hope for and the actual image the service users have on social commerce companies. This study provides effective improvement directions for social commerce companies by presenting current business problems and its solution plans. For this, This study selected Korea's representative social commerce business Ticket Monster, which is dominant in sales and staff size together with its excellent funding power through M&A by stock exchange with the US social commerce business Living Social with Amazon.com as a shareholder in August, 2011, as a target group of social commerce service provider. we have gathered questionnaires from both service providers and the users from October 22, 2012 until October 31, 2012 to conduct an empirical analysis. We surveyed 160 service providers of Ticket Monster We also surveyed 160 social commerce users who have experienced in using Ticket Monster service. Out of 320 surveys, 20 questionaries which were unfit or undependable were discarded. Consequently the remaining 300(service provider 150, user 150)were used for this empirical study. The statistics were analyzed using SPSS 12.0. Implications of the empirical analysis result of this study are as follows: First of all, There are order differences in the importance of social commerce CSF between two groups. While service providers regard Price Economic as the most important CSF influencing purchasing intention, the users regard 'Trust' as the most important CSF influencing purchasing intention. This means that the service providers have to utilize the unique strong point of social commerce which make the customers be trusted rathe than just focusing on selling product at a discounted price. It means that service Providers need to enhance effective communication skills by using SNS and play a vital role as a trusted adviser who provides curation services and explains the value of products through information filtering. Also, they need to pay attention to preventing consumer damages from deceptive and false advertising. service providers have to create the detailed reward system in case of a consumer damages caused by above problems. It can make strong ties with customers. Second, both service providers and users tend to consider that social commerce CSF influencing purchasing intention are Price Economic, Utility, Trust, and Word of Mouth Effect. Accordingly, it can be learned that users are expecting the benefit from the aspect of prices and economy when using social commerce, and service providers should be able to suggest the individualized discount benefit through diverse methods using social network service. Looking into it from the aspect of usefulness, service providers are required to get users to be cognizant of time-saving, efficiency, and convenience when they are using social commerce. Therefore, it is necessary to increase the usefulness of social commerce through the introduction of a new management strategy, such as intensification of search engine of the Website, facilitation in payment through shopping basket, and package distribution. Trust, as mentioned before, is the most important variable in consumers' mind, so it should definitely be managed for sustainable management. If the trust in social commerce should fall due to consumers' damage case due to false and puffery advertising forgeries, it could have a negative influence on the image of the social commerce industry in general. Instead of advertising with famous celebrities and using a bombastic amount of money on marketing expenses, the social commerce industry should be able to use the word of mouth effect between users by making use of the social network service, the major marketing method of initial social commerce. The word of mouth effect occurring from consumers' spontaneous self-marketer's duty performance can bring not only reduction effect in advertising cost to a service provider but it can also prepare the basis of discounted price suggestion to consumers; in this context, the word of mouth effect should be managed as the CSF of social commerce. Third, Trade safety was not derived as one of the CSF. Recently, with e-commerce like social commerce and Internet shopping increasing in a variety of methods, the importance of trade safety on the Internet also increases, but in this study result, trade safety wasn't evaluated as CSF of social commerce by both groups. This study judges that it's because both service provider groups and user group are perceiving that there is a reliable PG(Payment Gateway) which acts for e-payment of Internet transaction. Accordingly, it is understood that both two groups feel that social commerce can have a corporate identity by website and differentiation in products and services in sales, but don't feel a big difference by business in case of e-payment system. In other words, trade safety should be perceived as natural, basic universal service. Fourth, it's necessary that service providers should intensify the communication with users by making use of social network service which is the major marketing method of social commerce and should be able to use the word of mouth effect between users. The word of mouth effect occurring from consumers' spontaneous self- marketer's duty performance can bring not only reduction effect in advertising cost to a service provider but it can also prepare the basis of discounted price suggestion to consumers. in this context, it is judged that the word of mouth effect should be managed as CSF of social commerce. In this paper, the characteristics of social commerce are limited as five independent variables, however, if an additional study is proceeded with more various independent variables, more in-depth study results will be derived. In addition, this research targets social commerce service providers and the users, however, in the consideration of the fact that social commerce is a two-sided market, drawing CSF through an analysis of perception gap between social commerce service providers and its advertisement clients would be worth to be dealt with in a follow-up study.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.262-268
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• 2010

Virtual communities (VCs) have developed rapidly, with more and more people participating in them to exchange information and opinions. A virtual community is a group of people who may or may not meet one another face to face, and who exchange words and ideas through the mediation of computer bulletin boards and networks. A business-to-consumer virtual community (B2CVC) is a commercial group that creates a trustworthy environment intended to motivate consumers to be more willing to buy from an online store. B2CVCs create a social atmosphere through information contribution such as recommendations, reviews, and ratings of buyers and sellers. Although the importance of B2CVCs has been recognized, few studies have been conducted to examine members' word-of-mouth behavior within these communities. This study proposes a model of involvement, statistics, trust, "stickiness," and word-of-mouth in a B2CVC and explores the relationships among these elements based on empirical data. The objectives are threefold: (i) to empirically test a B2CVC model that integrates measures of beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors; (ii) to better understand the nature of these relationships, specifically through word-of-mouth as a measure of revenue generation; and (iii) to better understand the role of stickiness of B2CVC in CRM marketing. The model incorporates three key elements concerning community members: (i) their beliefs, measured in terms of their involvement assessment; (ii) their attitudes, measured in terms of their satisfaction and trust; and, (iii) their behavior, measured in terms of site stickiness and their word-of-mouth. Involvement is considered the motivation for consumers to participate in a virtual community. For B2CVC members, information searching and posting have been proposed as the main purpose for their involvement. Satisfaction has been reviewed as an important indicator of a member's overall community evaluation, and conceptualized by different levels of member interactions with their VC. The formation and expansion of a VC depends on the willingness of members to share information and services. Researchers have found that trust is a core component facilitating the anonymous interaction in VCs and e-commerce, and therefore trust-building in VCs has been a common research topic. It is clear that the success of a B2CVC depends on the stickiness of its members to enhance purchasing potential. Opinions communicated and information exchanged between members may represent a type of written word-of-mouth. Therefore, word-of-mouth is one of the primary factors driving the diffusion of B2CVCs across the Internet. Figure 1 presents the research model and hypotheses. The model was tested through the implementation of an online survey of CTrip Travel VC members. A total of 243 collected questionnaires was reduced to 204 usable questionnaires through an empirical process of data cleaning. The study's hypotheses examined the extent to which involvement, satisfaction, and trust influence B2CVC stickiness and members' word-of-mouth. Structural Equation Modeling tested the hypotheses in the analysis, and the structural model fit indices were within accepted thresholds: ${\chi}^2^$/df was 2.76, NFI was .904, IFI was .931, CFI was .930, and RMSEA was .017. Results indicated that involvement has a significant influence on satisfaction (p<0.001, ${\beta}$=0.809). The proportion of variance in satisfaction explained by members' involvement was over half (adjusted $R^2$=0.654), reflecting a strong association. The effect of involvement on trust was also statistically significant (p<0.001, ${\beta}$=0.751), with 57 percent of the variance in trust explained by involvement (adjusted $R^2$=0.563). When the construct "stickiness" was treated as a dependent variable, the proportion of variance explained by the variables of trust and satisfaction was relatively low (adjusted $R^2$=0.331). Satisfaction did have a significant influence on stickiness, with ${\beta}$=0.514. However, unexpectedly, the influence of trust was not even significant (p=0.231, t=1.197), rejecting that proposed hypothesis. The importance of stickiness in the model was more significant because of its effect on e-WOM with ${\beta}$=0.920 (p<0.001). Here, the measures of Stickiness explain over eighty of the variance in e-WOM (Adjusted $R^2$=0.846). Overall, the results of the study supported the hypothesized relationships between members' involvement in a B2CVC and their satisfaction with and trust of it. However, trust, as a traditional measure in behavioral models, has no significant influence on stickiness in the B2CVC environment. This study contributes to the growing body of literature on B2CVCs, specifically addressing gaps in the academic research by integrating measures of beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors in one model. The results provide additional insights to behavioral factors in a B2CVC environment, helping to sort out relationships between traditional measures and relatively new measures. For practitioners, the identification of factors, such as member involvement, that strongly influence B2CVC member satisfaction can help focus technological resources in key areas. Global e-marketers can develop marketing strategies directly targeting B2CVC members. In the global tourism business, they can target Chinese members of a B2CVC by providing special discounts for active community members or developing early adopter programs to encourage stickiness in the community. Future studies are called for, and more sophisticated modeling, to expand the measurement of B2CVC member behavior and to conduct experiments across industries, communities, and cultures.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.141-170
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• 2010

User created content (UCC) is created and shared by common users on line. From the user's perspective, the increase of UCCs has led to an expansion of alternative means of communications, while from the business perspective UCCs have formed an environment in which an abundant amount of new contents can be produced. Despite outward quantitative growth, however, many aspects of UCCs do not meet the expectations of general users in terms of quality, and this can be observed through pirated contents and user-copied contents. The purpose of this research is to investigate effective methods for fostering production of creative user-generated content. This study proposes two core elements, namely, reward and motivation, which are believed to enhance content creativity as well as the mediating factor and users' committement, which will be effective for bridging the increasing motivation and content creativity. Based on this perspective, this research takes an in-depth look at issues related to constructing the dimensions of reward and motivation in UCC services for creative content product, which are identified in three phases. First, three dimensions of rewards have been proposed: task dimension, social dimension, and organizational dimention. The task dimension rewards are related to the inherent characteristics of a task such as writing blog articles and pasting photos. Four concrete ways of providing task-related rewards in UCC environments are suggested in this study, which include skill variety, task significance, task identity, and autonomy. The social dimensioni rewards are related to the connected relationships among users. The organizational dimension consists of monetary payoff and recognition from others. Second, the two types of motivations are suggested to be affected by the diverse rewards schemes: intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation occurs when people create new UCC contents for its' own sake, whereas extrinsic motivation occurs when people create new contents for other purposes such as fame and money. Third, commitments are suggested to work as important mediating variables between motivation and content creativity. We believe commitments are especially important in online environments because they have been found to exert stronger impacts on the Internet users than other relevant factors do. Two types of commitments are suggested in this study: emotional commitment and continuity commitment. Finally, content creativity is proposed as the final dependent variable in this study. We provide a systematic method to measure the creativity of UCC content based on the prior studies in creativity measurement. The method includes expert evaluation of blog pages posted by the Internet users. In order to test the theoretical model of our study, 133 active blog users were recruited to participate in a group discussion as well as a survey. They were asked to fill out a questionnaire on their commitment, motivation and rewards of creating UCC contents. At the same time, their creativity was measured by independent experts using Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking. Finally, two independent users visited the study participants' blog pages and evaluated their content creativity using the Creative Products Semantic Scale. All the data were compiled and analyzed through structural equation modeling. We first conducted a confirmatory factor analysis to validate the measurement model of our research. It was found that measures used in our study satisfied the requirement of reliability, convergent validity as well as discriminant validity. Given the fact that our measurement model is valid and reliable, we proceeded to conduct a structural model analysis. The results indicated that all the variables in our model had higher than necessary explanatory powers in terms of R-square values. The study results identified several important reward shemes. First of all, skill variety, task importance, task identity, and automony were all found to have significant influences on the intrinsic motivation of creating UCC contents. Also, the relationship with other users was found to have strong influences upon both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. Finally, the opportunity to get recognition for their UCC work was found to have a significant impact on the extrinsic motivation of UCC users. However, different from our expectation, monetary compensation was found not to have a significant impact on the extrinsic motivation. It was also found that commitment was an important mediating factor in UCC environment between motivation and content creativity. A more fully mediating model was found to have the highest explanation power compared to no-mediation or partially mediated models. This paper ends with implications of the study results. First, from the theoretical perspective this study proposes and empirically validates the commitment as an important mediating factor between motivation and content creativity. This result reflects the characteristics of online environment in which the UCC creation activities occur voluntarily. Second, from the practical perspective this study proposes several concrete reward factors that are germane to the UCC environment, and their effectiveness to the content creativity is estimated. In addition to the quantitive results of relative importance of the reward factrs, this study also proposes concrete ways to provide the rewards in the UCC environment based on the FGI data that are collected after our participants finish asnwering survey questions. Finally, from the methodological perspective, this study suggests and implements a way to measure the UCC content creativity independently from the content generators' creativity, which can be used later by future research on UCC creativity. In sum, this study proposes and validates important reward features and their relations to the motivation, commitment, and the content creativity in UCC environment, which is believed to be one of the most important factors for the success of UCC and Web 2.0. As such, this study can provide significant theoretical as well as practical bases for fostering creativity in UCC contents.

• Journal of Technologic Dentistry
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.89-111
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• 1988

This study relates to the procedures and the attitude of dental technicians. In order to identify the attitude factors which have influence on the job satisfaction and the organizational commitment, self-administered questionnares were distributed by mail to 504 technicians randomlyselected from 482 dental laboratories registered in Korean Dental Lab. Association from February 6 to February 27, 1987. The following results were obtained: 1. Canonical correlation between the group of general variables and the group of job satisfactional variables was significant statistically as Rc=0.48. But canonical correlation between the group of general variables and the group of organizational commitment variables was insignificant statistically as Rc=0.37. 2. Canonical correlation between the group of job characteristic variables and the group of job satisfactional variables was highly significant statistically as Rc=0.69. Wage propriety, promotion opportunity and benefits propriety were highly influential factors among the job characteristic variables. 3. Canonical correlation between the group of job characteristic variables and the group of organizational commitment variables was highly significant statistically as Rc=0.61. Wage propriety, promotion opportunity of acquiring technique and duty importance were highly influential factors among the job characteristic variables. 4. The job characteristic variables which had influence on the job satisfaction varied statistically according to the general variables. in case of age, technical career, academic career and duty, the job characteristic variable was wage propriety and the business relations. 5. The job characteristic variables which had influence on the organizational commitment varied statistically according to the general variables. The case of male was applicable to wage propriety, the case of female was applicable to benefits propriety, the case of dental technicians who were less than 30 years old was applicable to wage propriety, the case of dental technicians who had more than 5 years technical career was applicable to monotonousness. 6. The most influential factor was wage propriety among job characteristic variables which influenced on the job satisfaction and the organizational commitment of dental technicians.