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The coronavirus outbreak has resulted in unprecedented measures, forcing authorities to make decisions related to establishing lockdowns in areas most affected by the pandemic. Social Media have supported people during this difficult time. On November 9, 2020, when the first vaccine with an efficacy rate over 90% was announced, social media reacted and people around the world began to express their feelings about this vaccination. This paper aims to analyze the dynamics of opinion on COVID-19 vaccination, in which the civil society is highly manifested in the vaccination process. We compared classical machine learning algorithms to select the best performing classifier. 4,392 tweets were collected and analyzed. The proposed approach can help governments create and evaluate appropriate communication tools to provide clear and relevant information to the general public, increasing public confidence in vaccination campaigns. © 2022 Copyright for this paper by its authors.
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This paper seeks to advance our understanding of the underlying reasons that sustain high levels of academic flying, and examines how a low‐carbon academia with less air travel might come about. Data from 30 interviews with academics showed that expectations of internationalisation, networking, and ideals of a productive academic stand among the strongest drivers of academic flying. These drivers come forth from underlying objectives such as pursuing excellence in research and working towards successful careers. Findings from this research suggest that institutional and cultural change are prerequisites to mainstream practical alternatives to academic flying, such as wider use of digital communication tools, grounded travelling, and low‐carbon conferences and meetings. We see a role for universities, grant‐providing authorities, and other academic organisations to include environmental standards and criteria in internationalisation strategies, the concept of excellence, and funding evaluation processes. From our analysis of academics' experiences during the COVID‐19 pandemic, we identify three factors that appear essential in determining whether digital communication tools can substitute for physical presence: (1) desired type of interaction, (2) existing social relations among participants, and (3) number of participants. Finally, we discuss whether and to what extent voluntary guidelines, the adoption of digital tools, and other soft measures may lead to cuts in academic flying at the scale and pace required for meeting climate targets, suggesting that enforcing limits on academic air travel might be unavoidable. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Geographical Journal is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)
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This article aims to explore the impact of digital communication tools application by citizens and the perceived usefulness of social media on the relationship between citizens and local authorities. The data were gathered in April–September 2020 through a survey (CAWI) among citizens of Poznan, Poland (n=502), and Kutaisi, Georgia (n=504), and were analyzed with structural equation modeling. The findings show that the intensity of digital communication tools usage for participation in the city branding and the perceived usefulness of social media contribute to the lasting relationships between citizens and local authorities in both countries. The novelty of this research concerns comparing two countries with different levels of development. Georgia is a developing economy in Europe and is in the process of modernizing the local governance across the cities. Poland, however, is a mature economy with a post-transformation heritage, where its cities benefit from considerable experience in building and developing citizen participation policies. Furthermore, the research was conducted amid the COVID-19 pandemic and evidenced the growing popularity of digital tools adoption by citizens in city matters. This study contributes to understanding the impact of digital tools on the relationship between citizens and local authorities in terms of city brand management. Citizens' participation in the city branding process via various digital communication tools increased citizen commitment towards long-lasting collaboration with local authorities. Moreover, citizens' perception of social media usefulness positively influences their desire to engage in the city branding process online, supporting the trust-building and collaboration between citizens and local authorities. Points for practitioners The intensiveness of digital tools usage – governments should identify the tools already trusted and popular among their audience and employ those tools to a greater extent to maximize the chances of feedback, high citizen participation, and commitment. Citizens' perception of social media – such characteristics as ease of use, transparency, ease of communication with the municipality, and safety encourage citizens to get involved in the city brand management process. Consequently, local authorities should consider the features mentioned above and develop the online tools quality.
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Hand gestures are part of communication tools that allows people to express their ideas and feelings. Those gestures can be used to insure a communication not only between people but also to replace traditional devices in human-machine interaction (HCI). This last leads us to use this technology in the E-learning domain. COVID'19 pandemic has attest the importance of E-learning. However, the Practical Activities (PA), as an important part of the learning process, are absent in the majority of E-learning plateforms. Therefore, this paper proposes a convolution neural network (CNN) method to ensure the detection of the hand gestures so the user can control and manipulate the virtual objects in the PA environment using a simple camera. To achieve this goal two datasets have been merged. Also the skin model and background subtraction were applied to obtain a performed training and testing datasets for the CNN. Experimental evaluation shows an accuracy rate of 97,2.%. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
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In Summer 2020, our university organized a two weeks summer research experience for 16 recently graduated first-generation and underrepresented high school students who would be joining University as incoming freshmen in various STEM majors. The summer camp was originally planned to be in-person with students residing in the university dorm to receive an early university experience and plan for their college life. But due to COVID-19, it had to be changed to a completely virtual format. This was the first time the faculty were organizing a two weeks camp in a complete virtual format. In this work, we discuss the overall virtual camp experience, challenges faced to provide effective experience to students in the online format, and evaluate the program based on student's feedback. We found that frequent breaks, activities that include students move around for some physical activity, interactive lesson plans, good communication tools, better planning and information tools are required to organize an efficient virtual program. In summer 2022, we plan to have second cohort of summer research camp and use the experiences from 2020 to improve the program. © 2022 IEEE.
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High Energy Accelerator Research Organization (KEK) launched an education project for the fabrication of an accelerator named "AxeLatoon" in 2020 together with the National Institute of Technology (KOSEN). This project aims to improve engineering skills of students and foster the next generation of accelerator researchers by providing hands-on training in the field of accelerator science. In the first year, we collaborated with the NIT (KOSEN), Ibaraki College to build an accelerator. Students took the initiative in this extracurricular activity and challenged building an accelerator. From 2021, we expanded this project to other prefectures and four schools are now participating. The design and fabrication of a small cyclotron accelerator is currently underway. Despite the restrictions on activities and the limited mobility of people due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, the project continues to educate students about basic technologies and accelerators. We are holding seminars a few times a month utilizing online communication tools. In this report, we would like to share the status of AxeLatoon's activities based on the actual production of students at KOSEN and deepen the discussion on accelerator outreach programs. © Copyright owned by the author(s) under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
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The repercussions, the rapid global changes, and the huge volume of renewable agricultural data and information require the presence of more rapid and effective tools in communicating with farmers. In addition to the requirements of farmers in terms of accuracy of information and the speed of providing correct extension information. Digital communication tools are very useful tools in agricultural extension. It is not just a tool for reaching a large audience, but also, an opportunity to develop relationships with farmers. In fact, virtual meetings were common long before the pandemic including web presence and engaging social media platforms. Abu Dhabi Agriculture & Food Safety Authority implemented the agriculture extension using a mobile application, in which a consultancy, technical information, and trainings were provided via online meetings using Microsoft Teams Program. The mobile application includes more than 125 topics in agriculture and machine learning to identify pests and plant diseases automatically. In the coronavirus pandemic like situation, when physical interactions became extremely restricted, the E-Extension played a key role in disseminating valuable technical information. In late 2020, a survey was carried out in randomly selected farmers in Abu Dhabi to measure the most important technical requirement that farmers wish to obtain, the best way to provide these services, and farmers satisfaction after applying the E-Extension. The results showed that providing the agriculture extension using mobile application, compared to the typical extension, showed increase of farmers satisfaction level of 54.3% within between 2019 and 2021 and increased the percentage of farmers engagement dramatically by 160.7%. In addition, the application proves its economic value and lowered the cost by 86%. © 2023 International Society for Horticultural Science. All rights reserved.
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This Industrial Revolution 4.0 is in boom across the globe;which is an indication for Universities and Colleges to adopt the future i.e. Education 4.0. Since the Last Decade, there has been a drastic change in the field of education. It has changed from physical learning to digital learning due to Covid-19. As digital learning came into the picture many developments have happened in using industrial revolution 4.0. This transformation has taught all of us how to use ICT effectively for conducting the lectures for the students remotely and smoothly. ICT has enabled new ways of student learning with the challenge of the availability of good learning platforms and tools. Industrial Revolution 4.0 and Education 4.0 work hand in hand for bringing new ways of learning. Industry 4.0 is majorly working on Robotic Process Automation, Industrial Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence, and Smart Technologies. All the Technologies which are associated with Industry 4.0 have a massive impact on individuals' everyday lifestyles. To improve education, learning skills, and personal skills in students, universities and colleges need to adopt Education 4.0 which is an evolution in the Education System. Teaching students digital technologies in their current syllabus will change the learning habits of the students which will in turn improve universities and colleges. Future of Education will be completely based on Education 4.0 which will restructure the current education system. This case study will be focusing on the selection of Digital Learning Platform and Communication Tools for Future Education 4.0 in India on the basis of different parameters. © 2022 IEEE.
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The purpose of this research is to look at the role of ICT in higher education institutions (HEIs) after Covid. Information and Communication (ICT) plays an important role in facilitating teaching and learning. ICT makes the classroom more interactive and collaborative. The education system knows the emergence of ICT in this changing digital media world. Earlier the ICT tools only used in the business and governance offices but due to pandemic the education system also used and learn the importance of the ICT tools. The way teachers and students engage and communicate with one another is one of the changes it has brought about. Given the limitations of restricted technology access and inequality in higher education in India, as well as economic considerations and technological know-how., it has to be seen how ICT can actually burgeon students and drive change in this field. This research also looks into the instruments and transformative potential of ICT in Indian higher education and in this study we used the questionnaire to investigate whether the ICT have aided the expansion of interactive learning and the teachers' role by collecting the sample of 1200 students studying in different streams of the University. Our findings contribute the valuable insights of the ICT opportunities and challenges to the students, researchers and learners. © 2022 IEEE.
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During the COVID-19 pandemic, there was an undeniable acceleration of time when social distancing measures were in place. Digital natives are the population group that was most accustomed to online tools, which allowed them to stay in contact and carry out their daily activities during the most critical stage of the pandemic. An important element that strengthens interaction in digital media is trust, both in the sources of information and in the medium. For this reason, quantitative research was developed in which the associations between trust in social networks and other digital communication tools in Mexican youth were analyzed. The study was conducted with students from public and private universities during 2021, when strict confinement measures still prevailed in Monterrey, Nuevo León. The study confirms some of the findings of other research in which trust is a fundamental variable in effective communication through digital channels. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
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Continuing schooling during the Covid-19 pandemic dramatically changed the way students, families, and teachers engaged with school and academic content. Remote instructional methods utilized by schools to reach students in their homes often relied on internet-based communication tools and individualized learning platforms, and divided instructional time into two categories: synchronous and asynchronous. We consider how synchronous learning moments, defined as live interaction between the focal children and their teachers via video or phone calls, were experienced by 109 families of elementary school children across the U.S. Specifically, we examine who had access to synchronous lessons, what happened during those lessons, and what parents and other caregivers noticed given their proximity and ability to observe the lessons first hand. We discuss how the sense of connection to peers and teachers that the synchronous interactions provided was critical to engaging students with school during the transition to distance learning. © ISLS.
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Several adverse consequences resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic. These have affected academia at many levels, including mandatory requirements for educators and students worldwide to switch to remote online learning or blended learning. This need exacerbated new technology and software learning to maintain proper communication and student engagement during online lectures. For instructors, these demands included learning how to use software to produce high-quality lessons, either in a pre-recorded format for asynchronous learning or through live online lectures for synchronous learning. For students, it meant rapid adaptability to learn video teleconferencing communication tools and a demand to keep up with multiple courses and learning management systems (LMS). Nonetheless, this accelerated learning of online communication tools bridges a technology gap that previously limited online international education. Students and instructors worldwide are now familiar with online connectivity tools;thus, it is essential to review potential opportunities to increase collaborative learning and education, particularly at an international level. In the past, Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) programs provided stewardship to global learning experiences at many universities worldwide. Broadly, these should cover four significant aspects: (a) collaborations with students in other countries with other backgrounds and cultures, (b) engagement through online interactions for assignment completion or lectures, (c) development and assessment of students' global perspectives and competencies, and a (d) reflective aspect of learning and education. This study reviews previous COIL implementations in the literature, emphasizing chemical engineering and other STEM courses. To our knowledge, COIL implementations are widespread in social sciences;however, few reports highlight these practices in engineering courses. We review perspectives, methodologies, challenges, and resources needed for positive and long-lasting COIL implementations here. In addition, we offer a plan to implement a short-term COIL-based project in a chemical engineering course with faculty participants from the US and El Salvador. Any engineering educators planning to implement COIL activities can use these suggestions. Ultimately, this low-cost pedagogy could significantly aid in promoting cultural, technical, and global competence in engineering students in the next post-pandemic years. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2022.
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Tabletop games that require the aid of a human facilitator are typically designed for a physical environment. However, during the COVID-19 pandemic, lockdown measures prevented people from gathering. Therefore, tabletop games were sometimes played and facilitated in a mediated environment using online communication tools instead. But this setting possibly deteriorates the players’ game experience. To understand the effect of playing facilitated tabletop games in a mediated environment we measured the player experience of the game Cue Kitchen in a mixed-method study comparing physical and mediated game sessions. Forty-four players played eleven game sessions, three in a physical environment and eight in a mediated environment. Of all seven dimensions of game experience measured, only one differed significantly between the two experimental conditions: players in a mediated environment became significantly more tired than players in a physical environment. The qualitative results explained why: players in a physical setting can wander off, while players in an online setting have to stay focused on their screen and, therefore, grow more tired. The research results suggest that facilitated tabletop games may be played in a mediated environment instead of a physical environment, without significant loss of player experience. © 2022, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
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The COVID-19 pandemic has forced companies to change their business processes under the constraint that they have to try reducing the face-to-face contact between their employees and customers. In this paper, the authors present the results of an analysis of business process transformation (BPT) during the COVID-19 pandemic from the viewpoint of a psychological contract and communication tool. The concept of the psychological contract was developed by Rousseau. In order to clarify the relationship between the psychological contract and the BPT effect, the authors developed a research model that consists of a psychological contract of an ordinary work environment, a psychological contract of BPT and BPT effectiveness. A survey was conducted in October, 2021 for the analysis. © 2022, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
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We present an approach for teaching introductory Scrum concepts through a playful online collaborative activity. It was conducted with 1st-semester students who never had any in-person contact and started their course under emergency online teaching during the Covid-19 pandemic. We adapted the Lego4Scrum approach and instead of plastic bricks, we combined an online whiteboard (Miro) with a communication tool (Discord) for teams. © 2022 Owner/Author.
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The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the use of technology in classroom experience with group collaborative projects. Group collaboration and the skills absorbed at the time of collaboration is an essential part of a student’s higher educational journey, because it prepares students for workplace collaboration post-graduation [1]. Prior to graduating, an undergraduate student will encounter at least one group project that is classified as a required deliverable in at least one of their course curriculums. In all technology related curriculums, computer-mediated communication (CMC) is an essential part of an instructor’s course material deliverable process, the way instructors communicate with their students, and the way students communicate with their peers. The need for a shift in the way humans communicate with one another has increased tremendously within the past two years [2]. We evaluated how effective CMC tools can enhance student outcomes for group projects specifically in the Covid-19 era and how students adopt to creative ways to engage and apply technology for effective communication. We also analyzed human factors confronting the use of CMC tools in the context of social distance policies and collaborative projects. We concluded by examining implications of group collaboration projects mandated in institutions for student success in the pandemic era. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
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This study aims to see Twitter as a medium for regional heads to succeed in vaccine policies. Anis Basewedan, Ridwan Kamil, and Ganjar Pranowo, as Governors, actively maximize Twitter to invite the public to support and want to be vaccinated, which is one of the keys to handling the Covid-19 crisis through the creation of herd immunity. The study used the Nvivo 12 Plus Qualitative Data Analysis Software (QDAS) approach. The data for this study used the Twitter social media of the three regional heads, namely @aniesbaswedan, @ridwankamil, and @ganjarpranowo. The results showed that the three of them were very active in informing the vaccination schedule, emphasizing the safety of vaccination, and inviting the public to want to be vaccinated. Through concise and clear messages, the three of them emphasize that one of the primary keys to getting out of the Covid-19 pandemic and recovering social and economic life is through vaccination. This research further highlights the usefulness of social media in crisis management, so it is necessary to continue to increase its use by leaders. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
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There are a large number of marketing communication tools that can increase the competitiveness of the enterprise by representing the advantages of the enterprise or its product over competitors on the Internet market. The main forms of enterprise promotion on the Internet are the website of the enterprise, search engine marketing, external company's activity on the Internet, brand promotion on the Internet, Rich-media. The Internet, as a platform for advertising, is ahead of other media in terms of growth. Therefore, assessing the efficiency of advertising, in particular Internet advertising, as a tool for enhancing the product competitiveness, is an important task for business specialists. In analysing the advertising activities of domestic enterprises, we see that tools such as print, television and radio advertising are less in demand among advertisers, while the volumes of Internet advertising are growing many times over. It is obvious that the pandemic crisis phenomenon caused by the covid-19 virus affected the working innovative methods of enterprises of all spheres and industries, many of them switched to remote work, separate from the consumer, and consumers physically distanced themselves for security purposes and began spending more time on the Internet and on social networks. The study improved the innovative methods of assessing the efficiency of the implementation of Internet communications using indicators "Objectives and key result - OKR", "Key performance indicators - KPI", "Key success indicators - KSI", "Balanced score cards - BSC", "Search distribution coefficient ","Net Promoter Score", "Number of subscribers/channels", "Share of valuable outputs" as criteria. The importance of assessing business process and effective functioning of key indicators is substantiated, its measurement requirements are determined. All indicators are considered over time in order to be able to justify their value, to track the change of indicators in the dynamics, as all indicators should stimulate the implementation of important actions for the enterprise.
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Increasing and streamlining cybersecurity is becoming an increasingly relevant trend in various aspects of the virtual environment. One of the areas concerning the current epidemiological situation associated with COVID-19 is the use of various communication tools. The importance of these tools is growing in Slovakia and abroad, whether in the framework of pedagogical, work or other activities and activities related to communication between selected entities. The cyber environment is a three-dimensional computer world analogous to the Internet in which users move using virtual reality. This sphere is affected by many changes that can affect individuals, societies, and states. Nowadays, the more and more growing importance of cybersecurity as an integral part of the security sector. It is a complex area that includes technologies and processes designed to protect systems, networks, and data from cyber-attacks. An essential part of the analysis and assessment form a variety of communication tools. Long-term trends in the use of communication tools are to ensure secure communication and data transfer. Due to the current epidemiological situation associated with COVID-19, digital education is becoming a standard part of the educational process. However, in addition to digital education, benefits also come with multiple security risks that may negatively affect individuals or organizations. The main objective of this paper is to determine the level of cybersecurity selected communication tools through indicators. Based on established criteria, the level of security can be further differentiated. The primary motivation for processing the paper is the growing demand for communication tools and platforms enabling audio-visual communication of several participants, emphasing security aspects of communication in a virtual environment. © 2021, National Defence University - Carol I Printing House. All rights reserved.
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Perioperative communication can be ineffective and result in delays or adverse events. Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has placed demands on health care leaders and personnel to integrate information quickly and accurately. When caring for patients diagnosed with COVID-19 or whose infection status was unknown, perioperative personnel at one facility discovered communication gaps associated with the environmental cleaning process and hand-over reports. A project team comprising perioperative nurses created five tools to provide critical information to help diverse team members share the same mental model. The project team created one tool in English and Spanish to meet the needs of environmental services personnel whose primary language was Spanish. The team created another tool to support communication with central processing department personnel and facilitate prioritization of case cart cleaning when needed. The development and implementation of the communication tools helped to provide a safe working environment during the COVID-19 pandemic.