This study discusses access to information and communication technology (ICT) in the context of food security in Soshanguve, a slum area of The City of Tshwane, the administrative Capital of South ...Africa. City dwellers access food from retail outlets in a country where dispatching food is a lucrative business. Hence, food price increases pose challenges to urban households. The public broadcaster (i.e., South African Broadcasting Corporation, other private television stations (eTV, eNCA, and radio stations broadcast food marketing information through eleven official languages. Digital food marketing through cellular phone networks is also on the rise. ICT is a potential tool in the fight against food insecurity and hunger, since its use and range of application continue to grow at astonishing rates. Using questions contained in the USAID developed Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS), questionnaires were administered to 300 randomly selected households in Soshanguve. Respondents were asked of their experiences of food insecurity (access) with a recall period of four weeks (30 days). Food secure households can utilise ICT tools in any manner to meet their food security needs. Our study finds that ICT access is positively associated with household food security. Transactional purchases of items on credit using cellular or landline telephony are, in particular, important in enhancing food security. Otherwise, households could beg for or borrow food from neighbours. Only the educated in Soshanguve purchase food items online by using computer access. Younger, single, educated, employed individuals mostly use ICT to advance the course of their food security.
Toward a Sociology of Privacy Anthony, Denise; Campos-Castillo, Celeste; Horne, Christine
Annual review of sociology,
07/2017, Letnik:
43, Številka:
1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
What are, and what should be, the boundaries between self and society, individuals and groups? To address these questions, we synthesize research on privacy that is relevant for two foundational ...sociological issues: social order and inequality. By synthesizing work on a narrow yet fundamental set of issues, we aim to improve our understanding of privacy as well as provide a foundation for understanding contemporary privacy issues associated with information and communication technology. We explore the role of privacy in maintaining social order by examining the connections of privacy with social control and with group cohesion. We also discuss how inequality produces variation in privacy and how this variation in turn contributes to inequality. Throughout the review we identify potential directions for sociological research on privacy generally and in the context of new technologies. Our discussion highlights implications of privacy that extend beyond individual-level concerns to broader social, structural impacts.
In recent decades, information and communication technology (ICT) has revolutionized the world affecting every aspect of life, including education, business, social activities, and environment. ...Consequently, the studies linking ICT and environmental sustainability are growing owing to its positive and adverse effects on environmental sustainability, and the noticeable disagreement in literature. Therefore, current work examines the criticality of ICT, human capital (education and return on education), and globalization in environmental sustainability, controlling urbanization and economic growth in the Latin American and Caribbean (LCA) region, where economic growth and globalization have substantially increased over the past three decades. Reliable panel econometric techniques, including second-generation unit root tests, Westerlund (2007, 2008) cointegration tests, and continuously-updated fully modified (CUP-BC) and continuously-updated bias-corrected (CUP-FM) long-run estimators are employed on the data for the period 1995–2017. The empirical estimations unfold that ICT (computed by a four components ICT index) and globalization contribute to reduce CO2 emissions. On the dark side, economic growth and urbanization degrade environment. Surprisingly, human capital adds to environmental degradation. The panel causality results reveal that ICT and globalization Granger cause CO2 emissions. These unique findings provide new insight to alleviate environmental degradation in the LCA region. Based on these outcomes, a comprehensive set of policies are directed for environmental sustainability.
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The current era of industrial development and innovation is revolutionized using the internet, robotics, and artificial intelligence. Nevertheless, the appraisal of global economic progress shows ...increasing trends, there are environmental degradation issues associated with this improvement. The role of renewable energy, urbanization and foreign direct investment received a lot of attention in the literature on environmental issues, however, the simultaneity with information communication technology is missing. Therefore, the present study used data from 10 emerging countries during 1996–2015 and applied the novel Method of Moments Quantile Regression to analyze the nexus among the variables. Further, we applied the second-generation unit root test, and Driscoll Kraay standard errors to reach robust results. The findings revealed an inverted U-shape relationship between economic growth and environmental degradation; thus, the validity of the Environmental Kuznets Curve is revealed. Moreover, foreign direct investment is significant and positive at 0.05th-0.50th quantiles, however, it becomes insignificant at higher quantile levels. Urbanization enhances while renewable energy mitigates carbon dioxide emissions at all quantile levels. Information communication technology proxied by internet usage reduces environmental degradation significantly at 0.25th-0.95th quantile levels. Results of the study suggest insights for the policymakers to mitigate carbon dioxide emissions through encouraging renewable energy and internet use.
This study explores self-reports of 241 older adults (aged 63-95) regarding loneliness and social disconnectedness, and the potential for information and communication technologies (ICT) and ...ride-hailing services to mitigate these phenomena. The samples are drawn from four older adult living communities in Maricopa County, Arizona. Lonelier older adults and older adults desiring greater social connections with friends, family, and outsiders appear to use ICT less and might benefit from ride-hailing services more than their less lonely and more socially connected counterparts. These findings are nuanced and depend on ICT device, type of ride-hailing service, and purpose of use. While desires for ride-hailing services were generally low, these services show promise in alleviating loneliness and increasing social connectedness, especially as older adults prepare to cease driving. Advice for implementing interventions and strategies to decrease the loneliness and increase social connectedness of community-dwelling older adults is elucidated and shared.
•We assess the productivity effects of R&D and ICT in a sample of nineteen industries in fourteen OECD countries between 1973 and 2007.•We identify four channels of transmission: input accumulation, ...technological change, technical efficiency and spillovers.•ICT has reduced technical inefficiency and generated inter-industry spillovers.•R&D has raised technical change and generated spillovers within sectors.•Over the time frame of our analysis ICT and R&D explain the 95% of TFP growth in the OECD area.
This study explores the channels through which technological investments affect productivity performance of industrialized economies. Using a Stochastic Frontier Model (SFM) we estimate the productivity effects of R&D and ICT for a large sample of OECD industries between 1973 and 2007, identifying four channels of transmission: input accumulation, technological change, technical efficiency and spillovers. Our results show that ICT has been particularly effective in reducing production inefficiency and in generating inter-industry spillovers, while R&D has raised the rate of technical change and favoured knowledge spillovers within sectors. We also quantify the contribution of technological investments to output and total factor productivity growth documenting that R&D and ICT accounted for almost 95% of productivity growth in the OECD area.
To examine how information and communication technology (ICT) access and use are conceptually incorporated in the Successful Aging 2.0 framework.
Using data from the 2011 National Health and Aging ...Trends Study (N = 6,476), we examined how ICT access and use for different purposes are associated with social engagement (i.e., informal and formal social participation) by gender. Weighted logistic regression analyses were performed.
Findings revealed that men were more likely to access and use ICT than women. ICT access was positively associated with all types of women's social engagement, but only with men's informal social participation. Information technology (IT) use for health matters was positively associated with formal social participation for women and with informal social participation for men. IT use for personal tasks was negatively associated with formal social participation for older adults. Communication technology use was positively associated with formal and informal social participation for women and men.
This study supports the expansion of the successful aging model by incorporating ICT access and use. Further, it assists in the identification of specific technologies that promote active engagement in later life for women and men.
Background
Information and communication technologies have become omnipresent in healthcare systems globally, and since nurses comprise the majority of the health sector workforce, they are expected ...to be adequately skilled to work in a technology‐mediated environment. Integrating nursing informatics into undergraduate nursing education is a cornerstone to nursing education and practice in Africa.
Aim
This scoping review aimed to evidence the integration of nursing informatics into undergraduate nursing education in Africa.
Methods
A scoping review of the literature used electronic databases including CINAHL Plus databases; EmCare; MEDLINE Ovid; Scopus; ERIC ProQuest; Web of Science; Google; and Google Scholar to locate papers specific to the African context. From a total of 8723 articles, 19 were selected for critique and synthesis.
Results
Selected studies indicated that nursing students used several information and communication technologies tools primarily for academic purposes, and rarely for clinical practice. In Africa, the challenges for teaching informatics in nursing education included: limited information and communication technologies skills among faculty and students; poor teaching strategies; and a lack of standardization of nursing informatics competencies. Successful integration of nursing informatics into undergraduate nursing education in African countries depends on restructuring nursing informatics content and teaching strategies, capacity building of the faculty and students in information and communication technologies, political commitment, and collaborative partnership.
Conclusion
Nursing informatics is scarce in undergraduate nursing education in Africa due to the implementation and adoption challenges. Responding to these challenges requires a multi‐sectoral approach in the revision of undergraduate nursing curricula.
Implication for nursing education, practice, policy and research
This study highlights the importance of nursing informatics in undergraduate nursing education, with its challenges and success. Nursing education policies should support the development of well‐standardized nursing informatics content and appropriate teaching strategies to deliver it. Further research is needed to establish which aspects of nursing informatics are integrated into undergraduate nursing education and nursing practice, implementation process, challenges and possible solutions. Collaborative partnerships are vital to developing nursing informatics policies to better prepare graduate nurses for the African healthcare workforce in the digital era.
The increasing use of the Internet for service delivery has paralleled an increase of e-service users' privacy concerns as technology offers ample opportunities for organizations to store, process, ...and exploit personal data. This may reduce individuals' perceived ability to control their personal information and increase their perceived privacy risk. A systematic understanding of individuals' privacy concerns is important as negative user perceptions are a challenge to service providers' reputation and may hamper service delivery processes as they influence users' trust and willingness to disclose personal information. This study develops and validates a model that examines the effect of organizational privacy assurances on individual privacy concerns, privacy control and risk perceptions, trust beliefs and non-self-disclosure behavior. Drawing on a survey to 547 users of different types of e-services – e-government, e-commerce and social networking – in Rwanda, and working within the framework of exploratory analysis, this study uses partial least square-structural equation modeling to validate the overall model and the proposed hypotheses. The findings show that perceptions of privacy risks and privacy control are antecedents of e-service users' privacy concerns, trust and non-self-disclosure behavior. They further show that the perceived effectiveness of privacy policy and perceived effectiveness of self-regulations influence both perceptions of privacy risks and control and their consequences; users' privacy concerns, trust and non-self-disclosure behavior. The hypotheses are supported differently across the three types of e-services, which means that privacy is specific to context and situation. The study shows that the effect of privacy assurances on trust is different in e-government services than in other services which suggest that trust in e-government may be more complex and different in nature than in other contexts. The findings serve to enhance a theoretical understanding of organizational privacy assurances and individual privacy concerns, trust and self-disclosure behavior. They also have implications for e-service providers and users as well as for regulatory bodies and e-services designers.
•Perceptions of privacy risk-control influence privacy concerns, trust and self-disclosure behavior.•Privacy policy influences perceptions of privacy risk and/or control, privacy concerns, trust and self-disclosure behavior.•Organizational privacy self-regulations influence users’ privacy concerns, trust and non-self-disclosure behavior.•Organization's strategies in executing privacy policies may reflect how effective the organization is in protecting personal information.•Privacy and trust in e-government are influenced by the level of trust users have in the government and its organizations.
Diabetes mellitus (DM) is one of the world's greatest health threats with rising prevalence. Global digitalization leads to new digital approaches in diabetes management, such as telemedical ...interventions. Telemedicine, which is the use of information and communication technologies, may provide medical services over spatial distances to improve clinical patient outcomes by increasing access to diabetes care and medical information.
This study aims to examine whether telemedical interventions effectively improve diabetes control using studies that pooled patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM), and whether the benefits are greater in patients diagnosed with T2DM than in those diagnosed with T1DM. We analyzed the primary outcome glycated hemoglobin A
(HbA
) and the secondary outcomes fasting blood glucose (FBG), blood pressure (BP), body weight, BMI, quality of life (QoL), cost, and time saving.
Publications were systematically identified by searching Cochrane Library, MEDLINE via PubMed, Web of Science Core Collection, Embase, and CINAHL databases for studies published between January 2008 and April 2020, considering systematic reviews (SRs), meta-analyses (MAs), randomized controlled trials (RCTs), and clinical trials (CTs). Study quality was assessed using the A Measurement Tool to Assess Systematic Reviews, Effective Public Health Practice Project, and National Institute for Health and Care Excellence qualitative checklist. We organized the trials by communication technologies in real-time video or audio interventions, asynchronous interventions, and combined interventions (synchronous and asynchronous communication).
From 1116 unique citations, we identified 31 eligible studies (n=15 high, n=14 moderate, n=1 weak, and n=1 critically low quality). We selected 21 SRs and MAs, 8 RCTs, 1 non-RCT, and 1 qualitative study. Of the 10 trials, 3 were categorized as real-time video, 1 as real-time video and audio, 4 as asynchronous, and 2 as combined intervention. Significant decline in HbA
levels based on pooled T1DM and T2DM patients data ranged from -0.22% weighted mean difference (WMD; 95% CI -0.28 to -0.15; P<.001) to -0.64% mean difference (95% CI -1.01 to -0.26; P<.001). The intervention effect on lowering HbA
values might be significantly smaller for patients with T1DM than for patients with T2DM. Evidence on the impact on BP, body weight, FBG, cost effectiveness, and time saving was smaller compared with HbA
but indicated potential in some publications.
Telemedical interventions might be clinically effective in improving diabetes control overall, and they might significantly improve HbA
concentrations. Patients with T2DM could benefit more than patients with T1DM regarding lowering HbA
levels. Further studies with longer duration and larger cohorts are necessary.
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