• Title/Summary/Keyword: Explanatory variables

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The Effects of Job Stress of Nurses Working in the General Hospitals on Their Turnover Intention -Mediating Effects Organizational Commitment- (종합병원 간호사의 직무스트레스가 이직의도에 미치는 영향 -조직몰입의 매개효과-)

  • Kim, Gyeong-Suk;Cho, In-Sook
    • Journal of the Korean Applied Science and Technology
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    • v.36 no.2
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    • pp.656-667
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    • 2019
  • This study is a descriptive research to grasp the effects of job stress on turnover intention and to confirm the mediating effect of organizational commitment according to the extent of job stress, organizational commitment and turnover intention in the relations between job stress and Turnover Intention of nurses working in general hospitals. Method: The subjects of this study were 199 nurses are working in general hospitals, that have more than 200 beds and less than 400 beds, located in Gwangju. I surveyed them using a structured questionnaire for collecting data from Sep. 01, 2017 to Sep. 20, 2017. The collected data were analyzed by the frequency, the percentage, t-test, ANOVA, Scheffe's Test, Pearson's Correlation Coefficient, Multiple Regression Analysis and Sobel Results: In the first step, job stress as an independent variable had a statistically significant effect on organizational commitment(${\beta}=-.321$, p<.001). In the second step, job stress, an independent variable, also had an important effect on turnover intention as a dependent variable(${\beta}=.389$, p<.001). Job stress and organizational commitment were meaningful predictor variables of turnover intention in the third step. The explanatory power of two variables was 45.5%. The value ${\beta}$ of job stress in the third step was .203(p<.001) which was smaller than its value ${\beta}$,.389(p<.001), in the second step. That meant organizational commitment had the mediating effect on turnover intention. The Sobel Test was conducted to verify the significance of the extent of the mediating effects of organizational commitment. The test result was that the value Z was -3.694 and the mediating effect of organizational commitment was significant on the relation between job stress and turnover intention(p<.002). Conclusion: this study is expected be useful to find ways to reduce subjects' turnover intention by decreasing their job stress, increasing their organizational commitment and developing intervention programs as basic data.

Meteorological Factors Associated with the Number of Emergency Room Patients with Wrist-Cutting Behavior (손목자해로 응급실에 내원한 환자수와 기후인자와의 관련성)

  • Han, Jae Hyun;Suh, Seung Wan;Cho, Gyu Chong;Kim, Jung Mi;Seo, Hong Taek;Jung, Yu Jin;Seong, Su Jeong;Hwang, Jae Yeon;Lee, Won Joon
    • Korean Journal of Psychosomatic Medicine
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    • v.28 no.2
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    • pp.161-167
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    • 2020
  • Objectives : Although the seasonality of suicide is a well-known phenomenon, little is reported about the seasonality of non-suicidal self-injury. The purpose of this study was to identify the seasonality of wristcutting behavior and to examine its relationship with meteorological factors. Methods : To identify the presence of seasonality, we investigated whether there was a difference in the average number of visits per month to an emergency room (ER) of an urban hospital for 226 patients with wrist-cutting behavior enrolled between December 2014 and May 2019. To ascertain significant meteorological factors, we used the multiple Poisson regression using generalized additive model with time, monthly temperature, monthly sunshine hour, and atmospheric pressure in the prior month as explanatory variables. Results : In males, the average number of monthly visits to the ER for wrist cutting behavior differed by month and was the highest in September (male : p=0.048, female : p=0.21, total : p=0.28). As a result of multiple regression analysis, the average number of patients admitted to the ER for wrist cutting behavior was related to the interaction between atmospheric pressure in the prior month and temperature in males (p=0.010), and showed a positive correlation with sunlight in females [p=0.044, β=4.70×10-3, 95% CI=(1.19×10-4, 9.27×10-3)]. Conclusions : Wrist cutting behavior shows seasonality in male, which is associated with changes in meteorological variables.

Feasibility of Tax Increase in Korean Welfare State via Estimation of Optimal Tax burden Ratio (적정조세부담률 추정을 통한 한국 복지국가 증세가능성에 관한 연구)

  • Kim, SeongWook
    • 한국사회정책
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    • v.20 no.3
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    • pp.77-115
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    • 2013
  • The purpose of this study is to present empirical evidence for discussion of financing social welfare via estimating optimal tax burden in the main member countries of the OECD by using Hausman-Taylor method considering endogeneity of explanatory variables. Also, the author produced an international tax comparison index reflecting theoretical hypotheses on revenue-expenditure nexus within a model to compare real tax burden by countries and to examine feasibility of tax increase in Korea. As a result of the analysis, the higher the level of tax burden was, the higher the level of welfare expenditure was, indicating the connection between high burden and high welfare from the aspect of scale. The results also indicated that the subject countries recently entered into the state of low tax burden. Meanwhile, Korea had maintained low burden until the late 1990s but the tax burden soared up since the financial crisis related to the IMF. However, due to the impact of foreign economy and the tax reduction policy, it reentered into the low-burden state after 2009. On the other hand, the degree of social welfare expenditure's reducing tax burden has been gradually enhanced since the crisis. In this context, the current optimal tax burden ratio of Korea as of 2010 may be 25.8%~26.5% of GDP based on input of welfare expenditure variables, a percent that Korea was investigated to be a 'high tax burden-low ITC' country whose tax increase of 0.7~1.4%p may be feasible and that the success of tax system reform for tax increase might be higher probability when compare to others. However, measures of increasing social security contributions and consumption tax were analyzed to be improper from the aspect of managing finance when compared to increase in other tax items, considering the relatively higher ITC. Tax increase is not necessarily required though there may be room for tax increase; the optimal tax burden ratio can be understood as the level that may be achieved on average when compared to other nations, not as the "proper" level. Thus, discussion of tax increase should be accompanied with comprehensive understanding of models of economic developmental difference from nations and institutional & historical attributes included in specific tax mix.

Change Prediction of Forestland Area in South Korea using Multinomial Logistic Regression Model (다항 로지스틱 회귀모형을 이용한 우리나라 산지면적 변화 추정에 관한 연구)

  • KWAK, Doo-Ahn
    • Journal of the Korean Association of Geographic Information Studies
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    • v.23 no.4
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    • pp.42-51
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    • 2020
  • This study was performed to support the 6th forest basic planning by Korea Forest Service as predicting the change of forestland area by the transition of land use type in the future over 35 years in South Korea. It is very important to analyze upcoming forestland area change for future forest planning because forestland plays a basic role to predict forest resources change for afforestation, production and management in the future. Therefore, the transitional interaction between land use types in future of South Korea was predicted in this study using econometrical models based on past trend data of land use type and related variables. The econometrical model based on maximum discounted profits theory for land use type determination was used to estimate total quantitative change by forestland, agricultural land and urban area at national scale using explanatory variables such as forestry value added, agricultural income and population during over 46 years. In result, it was analyzed that forestland area would decrease continuously at approximately 29,000 ha by 2027 while urban area increases in South Korea. However, it was predicted that the forestland area would be started to increase gradually at 170,000 ha by 2050 because urban area was reduced according to population decrement from 2032 in South Korea. We could find out that the increment of forestland would be attributed to social problems such as urban hollowing and localities extinction phenomenon by steep decrement of population from 2032. The decrement and increment of forestland by unbalanced population immigration to major cities and migration to localities might cause many social and economic problems against national sustainable development, so that future strategies and policies for forestland should be established considering such future change trends of land use type for balanced development and reasonable forestland use and conservation.

Prediction of patent lifespan and analysis of influencing factors using machine learning (기계학습을 활용한 특허수명 예측 및 영향요인 분석)

  • Kim, Yongwoo;Kim, Min Gu;Kim, Young-Min
    • Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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    • v.28 no.2
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    • pp.147-170
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    • 2022
  • Although the number of patent which is one of the core outputs of technological innovation continues to increase, the number of low-value patents also hugely increased. Therefore, efficient evaluation of patents has become important. Estimation of patent lifespan which represents private value of a patent, has been studied for a long time, but in most cases it relied on a linear model. Even if machine learning methods were used, interpretation or explanation of the relationship between explanatory variables and patent lifespan was insufficient. In this study, patent lifespan (number of renewals) is predicted based on the idea that patent lifespan represents the value of the patent. For the research, 4,033,414 patents applied between 1996 and 2017 and finally granted were collected from USPTO (US Patent and Trademark Office). To predict the patent lifespan, we use variables that can reflect the characteristics of the patent, the patent owner's characteristics, and the inventor's characteristics. We build four different models (Ridge Regression, Random Forest, Feed Forward Neural Network, Gradient Boosting Models) and perform hyperparameter tuning through 5-fold Cross Validation. Then, the performance of the generated models are evaluated, and the relative importance of predictors is also presented. In addition, based on the Gradient Boosting Model which have excellent performance, Accumulated Local Effects Plot is presented to visualize the relationship between predictors and patent lifespan. Finally, we apply Kernal SHAP (SHapley Additive exPlanations) to present the evaluation reason of individual patents, and discuss applicability to the patent evaluation system. This study has academic significance in that it cumulatively contributes to the existing patent life estimation research and supplements the limitations of existing patent life estimation studies based on linearity. It is academically meaningful that this study contributes cumulatively to the existing studies which estimate patent lifespan, and that it supplements the limitations of linear models. Also, it is practically meaningful to suggest a method for deriving the evaluation basis for individual patent value and examine the applicability to patent evaluation systems.

Factors Affecting Intention to Introduce Smart Factory in SMEs - Including Government Assistance Expectancy and Task Technology Fit - (중소기업의 스마트팩토리 도입의도에 영향을 미치는 요인에 관한 연구 - 정부지원기대와 과업기술적합도를 포함하여)

  • Kim, Joung-rae
    • Journal of Venture Innovation
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    • v.3 no.2
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    • pp.41-76
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    • 2020
  • This study confirmed factors affecting smart factory technology acceptance through empirical analysis. It is a study on what factors have an important influence on the introduction of the smart factory, which is the core field of the 4th industry. I believe that there is academic and practical significance in the context of insufficient research on technology acceptance in the field of smart factories. This research was conducted based on the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT), whose explanatory power has been proven in the study of the acceptance factors of information technology. In addition to the four independent variables of the UTAUT : Performance Expectancy, Effort Expectancy, Social Influence, and Facilitating Conditions, Government Assistance Expectancy, which is expected to be an important factor due to the characteristics of the smart factory, was added to the independent variable. And, in order to confirm the technical factors of smart factory technology acceptance, the Task Technology Fit(TTF) was added to empirically analyze the effect on Behavioral Intention. Trust is added as a parameter because the degree of trust in new technologies is expected to have a very important effect on the acceptance of technologies. Finally, empirical verification was conducted by adding Innovation Resistance to a research variable that plays a role as a moderator, based on previous studies that innovation by new information technology can inevitably cause refusal to users. For empirical analysis, an online questionnaire of random sampling method was conducted for incumbents of domestic small and medium-sized enterprises, and 309 copies of effective responses were used for empirical analysis. Amos 23.0 and Process macro 3.4 were used for statistical analysis. For accurate statistical analysis, the validity of Research Model and Measurement Variable were secured through confirmatory factor analysis. Accurate empirical analysis was conducted through appropriate statistical procedures and correct interpretation for causality verification, mediating effect verification, and moderating effect verification. Performance Expectancy, Social Influence, Government Assistance Expectancy, and Task Technology Fit had a positive (+) effect on smart factory technology acceptance. The magnitude of influence was found in the order of Government Assistance Expectancy(β=.487) > Task Technology Fit(β=.218) > Performance Expectancy(β=.205) > Social Influence(β=.204). Both the Task Characteristics and the Technology Characteristics were confirmed to have a positive (+) effect on Task Technology Fit. It was found that Task Characteristics(β=.559) had a greater effect on Task Technology Fit than Technology Characteristics(β=.328). In the mediating effect verification on Trust, a statistically significant mediating role of Trust was not identified between each of the six independent variables and the intention to introduce a smart factory. Through the verification of the moderating effect of Innovation Resistance, it was found that Innovation Resistance plays a positive (+) moderating role between Government Assistance Expectancy, and technology acceptance intention. In other words, the greater the Innovation Resistance, the greater the influence of the Government Assistance Expectancy on the intention to adopt the smart factory than the case where there is less Innovation Resistance. Based on this, academic and practical implications were presented.

The Relations between Financial Constraints and Dividend Smoothing of Innovative Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (혁신형 중소기업의 재무적 제약과 배당스무딩간의 관계)

  • Shin, Min-Shik;Kim, Soo-Eun
    • Korean small business review
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    • v.31 no.4
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    • pp.67-93
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    • 2009
  • The purpose of this paper is to explore the relations between financial constraints and dividend smoothing of innovative small and medium sized enterprises(SMEs) listed on Korea Securities Market and Kosdaq Market of Korea Exchange. The innovative SMEs is defined as the firms with high level of R&D intensity which is measured by (R&D investment/total sales) ratio, according to Chauvin and Hirschey (1993). The R&D investment plays an important role as the innovative driver that can increase the future growth opportunity and profitability of the firms. Therefore, the R&D investment have large, positive, and consistent influences on the market value of the firm. In this point of view, we expect that the innovative SMEs can adjust dividend payment faster than the noninnovative SMEs, on the ground of their future growth opportunity and profitability. And also, we expect that the financial unconstrained firms can adjust dividend payment faster than the financial constrained firms, on the ground of their financing ability of investment funds through the market accessibility. Aivazian et al.(2006) exert that the financial unconstrained firms with the high accessibility to capital market can adjust dividend payment faster than the financial constrained firms. We collect the sample firms among the total SMEs listed on Korea Securities Market and Kosdaq Market of Korea Exchange during the periods from January 1999 to December 2007 from the KIS Value Library database. The total number of firm-year observations of the total sample firms throughout the entire period is 5,544, the number of firm-year observations of the dividend firms is 2,919, and the number of firm-year observations of the non-dividend firms is 2,625. About 53%(or 2,919) of these total 5,544 observations involve firms that make a dividend payment. The dividend firms are divided into two groups according to the R&D intensity, such as the innovative SMEs with larger than median of R&D intensity and the noninnovative SMEs with smaller than median of R&D intensity. The number of firm-year observations of the innovative SMEs is 1,506, and the number of firm-year observations of the noninnovative SMEs is 1,413. Furthermore, the innovative SMEs are divided into two groups according to level of financial constraints, such as the financial unconstrained firms and the financial constrained firms. The number of firm-year observations of the former is 894, and the number of firm-year observations of the latter is 612. Although all available firm-year observations of the dividend firms are collected, deletions are made in the case of financial industries such as banks, securities company, insurance company, and other financial services company, because their capital structure and business style are widely different from the general manufacturing firms. The stock repurchase was involved in dividend payment because Grullon and Michaely (2002) examined the substitution hypothesis between dividends and stock repurchases. However, our data structure is an unbalanced panel data since there is no requirement that the firm-year observations data are all available for each firms during the entire periods from January 1999 to December 2007 from the KIS Value Library database. We firstly estimate the classic Lintner(1956) dividend adjustment model, where the decision to smooth dividend or to adopt a residual dividend policy depends on financial constraints measured by market accessibility. Lintner model indicates that firms maintain stable and long run target payout ratio, and that firms adjust partially the gap between current payout rato and target payout ratio each year. In the Lintner model, dependent variable is the current dividend per share(DPSt), and independent variables are the past dividend per share(DPSt-1) and the current earnings per share(EPSt). We hypothesized that firms adjust partially the gap between the current dividend per share(DPSt) and the target payout ratio(Ω) each year, when the past dividend per share(DPSt-1) deviate from the target payout ratio(Ω). We secondly estimate the expansion model that extend the Lintner model by including the determinants suggested by the major theories of dividend, namely, residual dividend theory, dividend signaling theory, agency theory, catering theory, and transactions cost theory. In the expansion model, dependent variable is the current dividend per share(DPSt), explanatory variables are the past dividend per share(DPSt-1) and the current earnings per share(EPSt), and control variables are the current capital expenditure ratio(CEAt), the current leverage ratio(LEVt), the current operating return on assets(ROAt), the current business risk(RISKt), the current trading volume turnover ratio(TURNt), and the current dividend premium(DPREMt). In these control variables, CEAt, LEVt, and ROAt are the determinants suggested by the residual dividend theory and the agency theory, ROAt and RISKt are the determinants suggested by the dividend signaling theory, TURNt is the determinant suggested by the transactions cost theory, and DPREMt is the determinant suggested by the catering theory. Furthermore, we thirdly estimate the Lintner model and the expansion model by using the panel data of the financial unconstrained firms and the financial constrained firms, that are divided into two groups according to level of financial constraints. We expect that the financial unconstrained firms can adjust dividend payment faster than the financial constrained firms, because the former can finance more easily the investment funds through the market accessibility than the latter. We analyzed descriptive statistics such as mean, standard deviation, and median to delete the outliers from the panel data, conducted one way analysis of variance to check up the industry-specfic effects, and conducted difference test of firms characteristic variables between innovative SMEs and noninnovative SMEs as well as difference test of firms characteristic variables between financial unconstrained firms and financial constrained firms. We also conducted the correlation analysis and the variance inflation factors analysis to detect any multicollinearity among the independent variables. Both of the correlation coefficients and the variance inflation factors are roughly low to the extent that may be ignored the multicollinearity among the independent variables. Furthermore, we estimate both of the Lintner model and the expansion model using the panel regression analysis. We firstly test the time-specific effects and the firm-specific effects may be involved in our panel data through the Lagrange multiplier test that was proposed by Breusch and Pagan(1980), and secondly conduct Hausman test to prove that fixed effect model is fitter with our panel data than the random effect model. The main results of this study can be summarized as follows. The determinants suggested by the major theories of dividend, namely, residual dividend theory, dividend signaling theory, agency theory, catering theory, and transactions cost theory explain significantly the dividend policy of the innovative SMEs. Lintner model indicates that firms maintain stable and long run target payout ratio, and that firms adjust partially the gap between the current payout ratio and the target payout ratio each year. In the core variables of Lintner model, the past dividend per share has more effects to dividend smoothing than the current earnings per share. These results suggest that the innovative SMEs maintain stable and long run dividend policy which sustains the past dividend per share level without corporate special reasons. The main results show that dividend adjustment speed of the innovative SMEs is faster than that of the noninnovative SMEs. This means that the innovative SMEs with high level of R&D intensity can adjust dividend payment faster than the noninnovative SMEs, on the ground of their future growth opportunity and profitability. The other main results show that dividend adjustment speed of the financial unconstrained SMEs is faster than that of the financial constrained SMEs. This means that the financial unconstrained firms with high accessibility to capital market can adjust dividend payment faster than the financial constrained firms, on the ground of their financing ability of investment funds through the market accessibility. Futhermore, the other additional results show that dividend adjustment speed of the innovative SMEs classified by the Small and Medium Business Administration is faster than that of the unclassified SMEs. They are linked with various financial policies and services such as credit guaranteed service, policy fund for SMEs, venture investment fund, insurance program, and so on. In conclusion, the past dividend per share and the current earnings per share suggested by the Lintner model explain mainly dividend adjustment speed of the innovative SMEs, and also the financial constraints explain partially. Therefore, if managers can properly understand of the relations between financial constraints and dividend smoothing of innovative SMEs, they can maintain stable and long run dividend policy of the innovative SMEs through dividend smoothing. These are encouraging results for Korea government, that is, the Small and Medium Business Administration as it has implemented many policies to commit to the innovative SMEs. This paper may have a few limitations because it may be only early study about the relations between financial constraints and dividend smoothing of the innovative SMEs. Specifically, this paper may not adequately capture all of the subtle features of the innovative SMEs and the financial unconstrained SMEs. Therefore, we think that it is necessary to expand sample firms and control variables, and use more elaborate analysis methods in the future studies.

Extension Method of Association Rules Using Social Network Analysis (사회연결망 분석을 활용한 연관규칙 확장기법)

  • Lee, Dongwon
    • Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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    • v.23 no.4
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    • pp.111-126
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    • 2017
  • Recommender systems based on association rule mining significantly contribute to seller's sales by reducing consumers' time to search for products that they want. Recommendations based on the frequency of transactions such as orders can effectively screen out the products that are statistically marketable among multiple products. A product with a high possibility of sales, however, can be omitted from the recommendation if it records insufficient number of transactions at the beginning of the sale. Products missing from the associated recommendations may lose the chance of exposure to consumers, which leads to a decline in the number of transactions. In turn, diminished transactions may create a vicious circle of lost opportunity to be recommended. Thus, initial sales are likely to remain stagnant for a certain period of time. Products that are susceptible to fashion or seasonality, such as clothing, may be greatly affected. This study was aimed at expanding association rules to include into the list of recommendations those products whose initial trading frequency of transactions is low despite the possibility of high sales. The particular purpose is to predict the strength of the direct connection of two unconnected items through the properties of the paths located between them. An association between two items revealed in transactions can be interpreted as the interaction between them, which can be expressed as a link in a social network whose nodes are items. The first step calculates the centralities of the nodes in the middle of the paths that indirectly connect the two nodes without direct connection. The next step identifies the number of the paths and the shortest among them. These extracts are used as independent variables in the regression analysis to predict future connection strength between the nodes. The strength of the connection between the two nodes of the model, which is defined by the number of nodes between the two nodes, is measured after a certain period of time. The regression analysis results confirm that the number of paths between the two products, the distance of the shortest path, and the number of neighboring items connected to the products are significantly related to their potential strength. This study used actual order transaction data collected for three months from February to April in 2016 from an online commerce company. To reduce the complexity of analytics as the scale of the network grows, the analysis was performed only on miscellaneous goods. Two consecutively purchased items were chosen from each customer's transactions to obtain a pair of antecedent and consequent, which secures a link needed for constituting a social network. The direction of the link was determined in the order in which the goods were purchased. Except for the last ten days of the data collection period, the social network of associated items was built for the extraction of independent variables. The model predicts the number of links to be connected in the next ten days from the explanatory variables. Of the 5,711 previously unconnected links, 611 were newly connected for the last ten days. Through experiments, the proposed model demonstrated excellent predictions. Of the 571 links that the proposed model predicts, 269 were confirmed to have been connected. This is 4.4 times more than the average of 61, which can be found without any prediction model. This study is expected to be useful regarding industries whose new products launch quickly with short life cycles, since their exposure time is critical. Also, it can be used to detect diseases that are rarely found in the early stages of medical treatment because of the low incidence of outbreaks. Since the complexity of the social networking analysis is sensitive to the number of nodes and links that make up the network, this study was conducted in a particular category of miscellaneous goods. Future research should consider that this condition may limit the opportunity to detect unexpected associations between products belonging to different categories of classification.

An Empirical Study on Motivation Factors and Reward Structure for User's Createve Contents Generation: Focusing on the Mediating Effect of Commitment (창의적인 UCC 제작에 영향을 미치는 동기 및 보상 체계에 대한 연구: 몰입에 매개 효과를 중심으로)

  • Kim, Jin-Woo;Yang, Seung-Hwa;Lim, Seong-Taek;Lee, In-Seong
    • 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.

The Variations of Stratospheric Ozone over the Korean Peninsula 1985~2009 (한반도 상공의 오존층 변화 1985~2009)

  • Park, Sang Seo;Kim, Jhoon;Cho, Nayeong;Lee, Yun Gon;Cho, Hi Ku
    • Atmosphere
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    • v.21 no.4
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    • pp.349-359
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    • 2011
  • The climatology in stratospheric ozone over the Korean Peninsula, presented in previous studies (e.g., Cho et al., 2003; Kim et al., 2005), is updated by using daily and monthly data from satellite and ground-based data through December 2009. In addition, long-term satellite data [Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS), Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI), 1979~2009] have been also analyzed in order to deduce the spatial distributions and temporal variations of the global total ozone. The global average of total ozone (1979~2009) is 298 DU which shows a minimum of about 244 DU in equatorial latitudes and increases poleward in both hemispheres to a maximum of about 391 DU in Okhotsk region. The recent period, from 2006 to 2009, shows reduction in total ozone by 6% relative to the values for the pre-1980s (1979~1982). The long-term trends were estimated by using a multiple linear regression model (e.g., WMO, 1999; Cho et al., 2003) including explanatory variables for the seasonal variation, Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (QBO) and solar cycle over three different time intervals: a whole interval from 1979 to 2009, the former interval from 1979 to 1992, and the later interval from 1993 to 2009 with a turnaround point of deep minimum in 1993 is related to the effect of Mt. Pinatubo eruption. The global trend shows -0.93% $decade^{-1}$ for the whole interval, whereas the former and the later interval trends amount to -2.59% $decade^{-1}$ and +0.95% $decade^{-1}$, respectively. Therefore, the long-term total ozone variations indicate that there are positive trends showing a recovery sign of the ozone layer in both North/South hemispheres since around 1993. Annual mean total ozone (1985~2009) is distributed from 298 DU for Jeju ($33.52^{\circ}N$) to 352 DU for Unggi ($42.32^{\circ}N$) in almost zonally symmetric pattern over the Korean Peninsula, with the latitudinal gradient of 6 DU $degree^{-1}$. It is apparent that seasonal variability of total ozone increases from Jeju toward Unggi. The annual mean total ozone for Seoul shows 323 DU, with the maximum of 359 DU in March and the minimum of 291 DU in October. It is found that the day to day variability in total ozone exhibits annual mean of 5.7% in increase and -5.2% in decrease. The variability as large as 38.4% in increase and 30.3% in decrease has been observed, respectively. The long-term trend analysis (e.g., WMO, 1999) of monthly total ozone data (1985~2009) merged by satellite and ground-based measurements over the Korean Peninsula shows increase of 1.27% $decade^{-1}$ to 0.80% $decade^{-1}$ from Jeju to Unggi, respectively, showing systematic decrease of the trend magnitude with latitude. This study also presents a new analysis of ozone density and trends in the vertical distribution of ozone for Seoul with data up to the end of 2009. The mean vertical distributions of ozone show that the maximum value of the ozone density is 16.5 DU $km^{-1}$ in the middle stratospheric layer between 24 km and 28 km. About 90.0% and 71.5% of total ozone are found in the troposphere and in the stratosphere between 15 and 33 km, respectively. The trend analysis reconfirms the previous results of significant positive ozone trend, of up to 5% $decade^{-1}$, in the troposphere and the lower stratosphere (0~24 km), with negative trend, of up to -5% $decade^{-1}$, in the stratosphere (24~38 km). In addition, the Umkehr data show a positive trend of about 3% $decade^{-1}$ in the upper stratosphere (38~48 km).