The width and depth of literacies for tackling the COVID-19 infodemic

PurposeA wide choice of varied information and data-based tools is reviewed in order to determine their ability treating symptoms of the COVID-19 infodemic. Several literacies and derived literacies, presumably having the ability to fulfil these roles are enumerated. There is also a review of the impact of applying deconstruction, understanding, and anticipation as well as of tools for mitigating overload phenomena, and communication overload.Design/methodology/approachThe article reviews literacies deemed to promise reducing the impact of the information crisis, caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.FindingsA non-exhaustive review of literature, taken from sources of varied disciplines, resulting from reverse snowballing and forward citation mining confirmed that there is a wide choice of solutions from among literacies, derived literacies and other approaches that have the potential to combat annoyance and anxiety, caused by the infodemic.Originality/valueNo other, published research has looked at such a wide range of literacies and derived literacies, as well as other, related approaches linked them to the COVID-19 infodemic.

The effectiveness of teaching virtual reality-based business ethics: is it really suitable for all learning styles?

Purpose>Previous research examined the effectiveness of virtual reality (VR) in various fields including engineering (Alhalabi, 2016), the military (Webster, 2016), robotic surgery (Bric et al., 2016;Francis et al., 2020), firefighters (Çakiroglu and Gökoglu, 2019), negotiation training (Ding et al., 2020), health-care training (Chow et al., 2017) and ethics education (Sholihin et al., 2020). However, empirical research examining learning styles on the effectiveness of using VR is still scarce. VR has different characteristics from other learning media and high immersiveness in a VR environment can create a sense of presence that improves learning outcomes, except for students with certain learning styles who experience cognitive overload when exploring virtual environments (Hsu et al., 2017). Therefore, it is necessary to investigate to what extent learning styles can influence the effectiveness of VR-based learning on business ethics. This is because the effectiveness of business ethics education is indispensable along with the increasing cases of fraud and financial companies (PwC's Global Economic Crime and Fraud, 2020).Design/methodology/approach>Education must respond to the progress of information technology (IT) development by providing IT-based teaching methods to enhance the learning process. This is because the evolution of technology is changing student learning preferences from verbal to visual or even virtual (Proserpio and Gioia, 2007). VR is an IT-based learning media that creates a virtual environment which simulates the real world and provides concrete experiences, so students are able to actively explore their course material. VR technology is able to provide practical experiences without actually leaving home, so it is relevant for responding to the current situation due to the COVID-19 pandemic.Findings>Compared to traditional learning, VR is a more flexible learning method as it has no limitations of time, distance and space (Yu et al., 2007). The main characteristic of VR is immersion, interaction and imagination (Zhang et al., 2017) that improve cognitive performance in engineering (Alhalabi, 2016), the military (Webster, 2016) and surgical robots (Bric et al., 2016). VR-based learning can improve students' learning abilities compared to traditional teaching (Jena, 2016). VR has already proven effective in teaching business ethics (Sholihin et al., 2020) because VR has the ability to create a virtual world, without any impact from socially reprehensible acts. With VR, students are able to understand scenarios about ethical dilemmas that occur in business practices, observe the potential consequences and make decisions to solve concrete situations where ethical dilemmas require a response. VR allows students to simulate situations virtually and develop their long-term experience. This is crucial because there is the possibility that in the near future the society will live in a mixed world (virtual and physical space).Practical implications>A virtual environment that is able to evoke a sense of presence refers to the intensity of emotional involvement. Sense of presence can actually improve the learning results, but if the user lacks the ability to explore game tasks it will cause a cognitive overload that has a negative impact on learning outcomes (Hsu et al., 2017;Huang et al., 2020). Learning style preferences cause differences in cognitive load during the learning process using VR (Hsu et al., 2017). In a VR-based learning environment, students are required to explore the virtual environment;therefore, without navigation, students with active experimental learning styles are superior to students with passive or observing learning styles (Chen et al., 2005). Therefore, it is necessary to understand the impact of adopting VR technology to improve student's performance by considering different learning styles.Social implications>In Indonesia, the shift from offline learning to e-learning has created new academic pressures for some students (Pajarianto et al., 2020). The main chall nge f r educators is how to improve student's learning outcomes and overcome the problem of using e-learning technology.Originality/value>In light of the scarcity of research on the effectiveness of VR for teaching business ethics during the COVID-19 pandemic, this study fills the gap by extending the study of Sholihin et al. (2020) in that the authors establish the connection between user perception of the use of VR and learning style in relation to the effectiveness of VR.

The moderating effect of technology overload on the ability of online learning to meet students' basic psychological needs

Purpose>Most students are considered digital natives and are presumably equipped to handle extensive technology use. However, online learning turns students into involuntary telecommuters when it is the primary modality. The prevailing trends of online learning, digital socialization, telehealth and other online services, combined with remote work has increased students' reliance on information and communications technologies (ICTs) for all purposes, which may be overwhelming. We examine how technology overload strains the ability of online learning to meet students' basic psychological needs (BPNs), which can decrease positive outcomes such as academic enjoyment and personal performance.Design/methodology/approach>Data was collected via an online survey of 542 university students and the proposed model was tested using partial least squares (PLS) regression.Findings>We find that technology overload can diminish the positive relationship between online learning intensity and BPNs satisfaction, which is alarming because BPNs satisfaction is critical to students' positive experiences. Moreover, we find that technology overload and lack of technology experience can directly drive BPNs frustration, which decreases positive outcomes and increases academic anxiety.Originality/value>We extend a theoretical framework for telecommuting to examine online learning. Additionally, we consider the role of technology overload and experience both as drivers and as moderators of students' BPNs satisfaction and frustration in online learning. Our results provide valuable insights that can inform efforts to rebalance the deployment of ICTs to facilitate online educational experiences.

The Impact of COVID-19 on the Health and Experience of the Carers of Older Family Members Living with Dementia: An Italian–Hungarian Comparative Study

This quantitative study (n = 370) compares the pandemic-related experiences of the family carers of older people living with dementia during the first wave of the pandemic, in two countries with different care regimes: Italy (Mediterranean) and Hungary (Eastern European). It aims at answering the following research questions: (1) How did the pandemic affect the subjective health of carers, and what were their experiences with care-related worries and workload? (2) What factors significantly predicted negative changes in these experiences? (3) What were carers’ main difficulties during the first pandemic wave? Results have shown that carers in both samples reported a worsening in mental health (Italy/Hungary: M = 2.25/2.55, SD = 0.93/0.99), and Italian carers also in general health (M = 2.54, SD = 0.98) (on a scale of 1 to 5, with values under “3” representing deterioration). Carers in both samples experienced high worry levels (Italy/Hungary: M = 4.2/3.7, SD = 0.93/0.89) and feeling overwhelmed with care tasks (M = 3.2/3.7, SD = 1.3/1.3) (on a scale of 1 to 5, higher values representing higher worry/work overload). In regression models, all of the above negative experiences were predicted by a combination of factors. Two of these factors stood out in importance due to being a predictor of more than one type of negative experience: a decline in the carer–care receiver relationship, predicting work overload, as well as general and mental health deterioration and being the child of the care receiver, predicting both high worry and subjective work overload. The top five encountered problems were the unavailability of medical and social care, difficulties with shopping (medicine included), restricted freedom, isolation, and anxiety.

A flexible approach for virtual machine selection in cloud data centers with AHP: Practice & Experience

Increasing resource efficiency and reducing the energy consumption of cloud data centers is critical, especially during the global CORONA virus pandemic. Virtual machines' consolidation using live migration maximizes the hosts' and the reduction of energy consumption. An increase in the host's virtual machines in the consolidation process and the dynamic workload of the virtual machines may cause the overloading in the hosts. One approach to overcome this problem is reducing the hosts' virtual machines. One crucial issue to improve the quality of the consolidation process's quality is determining the best virtual machine for the migration process. Although the selection process has lower computational complexity than other challenges (like placement and overload prediction) in the consolidation process, this issue has received less attention. This article aims to present an efficient algorithm for the selection process. We first considered five main criteria for the selection process: migration time, migration risk, virtual machine connectivity, releasable resources, and penalty for SLA violation. Then, we propose an algorithm based on analytic hierarchy process multi‐criteria decision‐making technique. Next, to determine the weight of the proposed criteria, we simulate thousands of virtual machines of the PlanetLab workloads. These weights are tunable based on the data center preferences. The results of the suggested approach results show 23% reduction in the hosts' energy consumption, 49% reduction in the number of migrations, and 18% reduction in the SLA violation compared with other techniques. So, using the proposed method may significantly reduce the overall cost of the data centers.

Spatio-Temporal Patterns of the Land Carrying Capacity of Tibet Based on Grain Demand and Calorie Requirement

Tibet constitutes a major part of the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau (QTP) and is a typical ethnic minority (e.g., Tibetan) and ecologically fragile area in the world. Land resources are one of the most important foundations of food production, and Tibet’s increasingly multi-type food demands are putting new pressure on land resources. However, there is still debate on how many people can be supported with the food production in Tibet. Investigating the land carrying capacity (LCC) in Tibet is very important for maintaining food security and formulating sustainable land management and utilization. Based on an analysis of the unique characteristics of the local farming, pastoral production, and dietary consumption, the spatio-temporal patterns of theLCC in Tibet in 2000–2019 were quantitatively assessed against the grain demands and calorie requirements at three different standards of living (i.e., basic prosperity, comprehensive moderate prosperity, and affluence). The dietary consumption was characterized by the high consumption of grains and meat products, and the low consumption of fruits and vegetables. The LCC in Tibet has continued to increase. The LCC in approximately 60% of the counties increased, with the high-LCC counties concentrated mainly in the Yarlung Zangbo River—Nyangqu River—Lhasa River area, and municipal districts and pastoral counties generally experiencing a low LCC. The load on land resources (LoL) in Tibet exhibited the characteristic of overall balance with local overloads and increasing tensions. More than 50% of the counties experienced population overload, mainly in municipal districts and pastoral counties. Food surplus was mainly found in farming counties, while the food production in pastoral counties was generally unable to meet the calorie demand. Considering the important role of land use in maintaining regional food security and ecological security, the conversion of grassland to cultivated land, the occupation of cultivated land, and the phenomenon of cultivated land was used to non grain should be avoided. Trans-regional transport of food should be strengthened to meet the calorie needs in population overload areas in the future. Our study provides a perspective for evaluating the pressure of land resources. The result can provide a reference for realizing the balance of grain and calorie supply–demand and lay a foundation for formulating sustainable land use policies in the QPT.