• Journal of Veterinary Clinics
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.71-78
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• 2024

Changes in elimination behavior, including urination and defecation, are common clinical signs of numerous disorders in cats. Therefore, this study attempted to automatically measure the elimination behavior of cats using the litter box and develop an early warning system for the guardian in case of abnormalities. To construct an early warning system for abnormal changes through cat elimination behavior, it consisted of a litter box, an automatic sensor for data collection and data wifi transmission, a server for data analysis, and a mobile phone app for result transmission and early warning. To establish the reference interval (RI), the elimination behavior was monitored for more than 2 weeks using a motion sensor within a litter box in 37 healthy cats and 19 diseased cats. The data were expressed as daily total visits, daily total stay duration, average stay duration per elimination, weekly total visits, and weekly total stay duration. Healthy cats showed median daily total visits of 3 times/day (RI 1.0-7.0) and daily total stay duration of 192 s/day (RI 8.0-452.0). For weekly data, the median total visits were 20 times/week (RI 3.0-35.25) and the median total stay duration was 1,147 s/week (RI 80.0-2,249.5). The average stay duration per elimination was 59 s/elimination (RI 4.67-132.0). Diseased cats showed more frequent elimination behavior than healthy cats (p < 0.001). Otherwise, for each elimination, diseased cats had shorter stay durations than healthy cats (p < 0.001). This study established the RIs of elimination behavior parameters (frequency and duration) in healthy cats. The present study might help guardians and veterinarians detect changes in elimination behaviors in diseased cats at an early stage.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.53-69
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• 2011

Vision and voice-based technologies are commonly utilized for human-robot interaction. But it is widely recognized that the performance of vision and voice-based interaction systems is deteriorated by a large margin in the real-world situations due to environmental and user variances. Human users need to be very cooperative to get reasonable performance, which significantly limits the usability of the vision and voice-based human-robot interaction technologies. As a result, touch screens are still the major medium of human-robot interaction for the real-world applications. To empower the usability of robots for various services, alternative interaction technologies should be developed to complement the problems of vision and voice-based technologies. In this paper, we propose the use of accelerometer-based gesture interface as one of the alternative technologies, because accelerometers are effective in detecting the movements of human body, while their performance is not limited by environmental contexts such as lighting conditions or camera's field-of-view. Moreover, accelerometers are widely available nowadays in many mobile devices. We tackle the problem of classifying acceleration signal patterns of 26 English alphabets, which is one of the essential repertoires for the realization of education services based on robots. Recognizing 26 English handwriting patterns based on accelerometers is a very difficult task to take over because of its large scale of pattern classes and the complexity of each pattern. The most difficult problem that has been undertaken which is similar to our problem was recognizing acceleration signal patterns of 10 handwritten digits. Most previous studies dealt with pattern sets of 8~10 simple and easily distinguishable gestures that are useful for controlling home appliances, computer applications, robots etc. Good features are essential for the success of pattern recognition. To promote the discriminative power upon complex English alphabet patterns, we extracted 'motion trajectories' out of input acceleration signal and used them as the main feature. Investigative experiments showed that classifiers based on trajectory performed 3%~5% better than those with raw features e.g. acceleration signal itself or statistical figures. To minimize the distortion of trajectories, we applied a simple but effective set of smoothing filters and band-pass filters. It is well known that acceleration patterns for the same gesture is very different among different performers. To tackle the problem, online incremental learning is applied for our system to make it adaptive to the users' distinctive motion properties. Our system is based on instance-based learning (IBL) where each training sample is memorized as a reference pattern. Brute-force incremental learning in IBL continuously accumulates reference patterns, which is a problem because it not only slows down the classification but also downgrades the recall performance. Regarding the latter phenomenon, we observed a tendency that as the number of reference patterns grows, some reference patterns contribute more to the false positive classification. Thus, we devised an algorithm for optimizing the reference pattern set based on the positive and negative contribution of each reference pattern. The algorithm is performed periodically to remove reference patterns that have a very low positive contribution or a high negative contribution. Experiments were performed on 6500 gesture patterns collected from 50 adults of 30~50 years old. Each alphabet was performed 5 times per participant using $Nintendo{(R)}$ $Wii^{TM}$ remote. Acceleration signal was sampled in 100hz on 3 axes. Mean recall rate for all the alphabets was 95.48%. Some alphabets recorded very low recall rate and exhibited very high pairwise confusion rate. Major confusion pairs are D(88%) and P(74%), I(81%) and U(75%), N(88%) and W(100%). Though W was recalled perfectly, it contributed much to the false positive classification of N. By comparison with major previous results from VTT (96% for 8 control gestures), CMU (97% for 10 control gestures) and Samsung Electronics(97% for 10 digits and a control gesture), we could find that the performance of our system is superior regarding the number of pattern classes and the complexity of patterns. Using our gesture interaction system, we conducted 2 case studies of robot-based edutainment services. The services were implemented on various robot platforms and mobile devices including $iPhone^{TM}$. The participating children exhibited improved concentration and active reaction on the service with our gesture interface. To prove the effectiveness of our gesture interface, a test was taken by the children after experiencing an English teaching service. The test result showed that those who played with the gesture interface-based robot content marked 10% better score than those with conventional teaching. We conclude that the accelerometer-based gesture interface is a promising technology for flourishing real-world robot-based services and content by complementing the limits of today's conventional interfaces e.g. touch screen, vision and voice.

• The Journal of Society for e-Business Studies
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.137-152
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• 2017

The decline in the price of IT devices and the development of the Internet have created a new field called Internet of Things (IoT). IoT, which creates new services by connecting all the objects that are in everyday life to the Internet, is pioneering new forms of business that have not been seen before in combination with Big Data. The prospect of IoT can be said to be unlimited in its utilization. In addition, studies of standardization organizations for smooth connection of these IoT devices are also active. However, there is a part of this study that we overlook. In order to control IoT equipment or acquire information, it is necessary to separately develop interworking issues (IP address, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, NFC, etc.) and related application software or apps. In order to solve these problems, existing research methods have been conducted on augmented reality using GPS or markers. However, there is a disadvantage in that a separate marker is required and the marker is recognized only in the vicinity. In addition, in the case of a study using a GPS address using a 2D-based camera, it was difficult to implement an active interface because the distance to the target device could not be recognized. In this study, we use 3D Depth recognition camera to be installed on smartphone and calculate the space coordinates automatically by linking the distance measurement and the sensor information of the mobile phone without a separate marker. Coordination inquiry finds equipment of IoT and enables information acquisition and control of corresponding IoT equipment. Therefore, from the user's point of view, it is possible to reduce the burden on the problem of interworking of the IoT equipment and the installation of the app. Furthermore, if this technology is used in the field of public services and smart glasses, it will reduce duplication of investment in software development and increase in public services.

• Journal of Korean Home Economics Education Association
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.133-148
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• 2022

This study aims to explore the status and motives for using avatars and digital fashion items in the metaverse and to examine consumers' purchase satisfaction and future purchase intentions. We intend to provide implications for the development of avatars and fashion items, and the direction of the fashion industry and clothing education. For this purpose, the purchasing status, consumer motives for using avatars and digital fashion items, purchase satisfaction, and future purchase intentions were investigated, through a survey with 149 consumers aged 19 years or older, with the experience of using avatars. The results are as follows. First, the percentage of avatar ownership was high among women aged between 19 and 29, and those with low or high incomes. The younger group was more likely to make mobile phone purchases than the older group, and the older group was more likely to use credit cards. Even those respondents who owned avatars did not purchase frequently or spent a lot on items. On the other hand, in the case of fashion item purchases, the group spending more than 8,000 won was aged between 19 and 29, and the frequency and amount of purchases increased as income increase. Second, among the motives for using avatars and fashion items, the pursuit of pleasure had the greatest influence, and men paid more attention to self-expression through avatars than women. Third, the motive for vicarious satisfaction influenced purchase satisfaction, and the factors that influenced future purchase intention were vicarious satisfaction and stress relief. The results of this study suggests that avatars and fashion items should be developed considering factors that can relieve stress for all age groups, create a sense of unity among metaverse users, and provide satisfaction in a virtual world that is different from reality. In addition, education on how to use fashion items and consumption attitudes in education related to clothing life will be required.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.31-54
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• 2007

The exchange between buyers and sellers in the industrial market is changing from short-term to long-term relationships. Long-term relationships are governed mainly by formal contracts or informal agreements, but many scholars are now asserting that controlling relationship by using formal contracts under environmental dynamism is inappropriate. In this case, partners will depend on each other's flexibility or interdependence. The former, flexibility, provides a general frame of reference, order, and standards against which to guide and assess appropriate behavior in dynamic and ambiguous situations, thus motivating the value-oriented performance goals shared between partners. It is based on social sacrifices, which can potentially minimize any opportunistic behaviors. The later, interdependence, means that each firm possesses a high level of dependence in an dynamic channel relationship. When interdependence is high in magnitude and symmetric, each firm enjoys a high level of power and the bonds between the firms should be reasonably strong. Strong shared power is likely to promote commitment because of the common interests, attention, and support found in such channel relationships. This study deals with environmental dynamism in high-tech industry. Firms in the high-tech industry regard it as a key success factor to successfully cope with environmental changes. However, due to the lack of studies dealing with environmental dynamism and supply chain commitment in the high-tech industry, it is very difficult to find effective strategies to cope with them. This paper presents the results of an empirical study on the relationship between environmental dynamism and supply chain commitment in the high-tech industry. We examined the effects of consumer, competitor, and technological dynamism on supply chain commitment. Additionally, we examined the moderating effects of flexibility and dependence of supply chains. This study was confined to the type of high-tech industry which has the characteristics of rapid technology change and short product lifecycle. Flexibility among the firms of this industry, having the characteristic of hard and fast growth, is more important here than among any other industry. Thus, a variety of environmental dynamism can affect a supply chain relationship. The industries targeted industries were electronic parts, metal product, computer, electric machine, automobile, and medical precision manufacturing industries. Data was collected as follows. During the survey, the researchers managed to obtain the list of parts suppliers of 2 companies, N and L, with an international competitiveness in the mobile phone manufacturing industry; and of the suppliers in a business relationship with S company, a semiconductor manufacturing company. They were asked to respond to the survey via telephone and e-mail. During the two month period of February-April 2006, we were able to collect data from 44 companies. The respondents were restricted to direct dealing authorities and subcontractor company (the supplier) staff with at least three months of dealing experience with a manufacture (an industrial material buyer). The measurement validation procedures included scale reliability; discriminant and convergent validity were used to validate measures. Also, the reliability measurements traditionally employed, such as the Cronbach's alpha, were used. All the reliabilities were greater than.70. A series of exploratory factor analyses was conducted. We conducted confirmatory factor analyses to assess the validity of our measurements. A series of chi-square difference tests were conducted so that the discriminant validity could be ensured. For each pair, we estimated two models-an unconstrained model and a constrained model-and compared the two model fits. All these tests supported discriminant validity. Also, all items loaded significantly on their respective constructs, providing support for convergent validity. We then examined composite reliability and average variance extracted (AVE). The composite reliability of each construct was greater than.70. The AVE of each construct was greater than.50. According to the multiple regression analysis, customer dynamism had a negative effect and competitor dynamism had a positive effect on a supplier's commitment. In addition, flexibility and dependence had significant moderating effects on customer and competitor dynamism. On the other hand, all hypotheses about technological dynamism had no significant effects on commitment. In other words, technological dynamism had no direct effect on supplier's commitment and was not moderated by the flexibility and dependence of the supply chain. This study makes its contribution in the point of view that this is a rare study on environmental dynamism and supply chain commitment in the field of high-tech industry. Especially, this study verified the effects of three sectors of environmental dynamism on supplier's commitment. Also, it empirically tested how the effects were moderated by flexibility and dependence. The results showed that flexibility and interdependence had a role to strengthen supplier's commitment under environmental dynamism in high-tech industry. Thus relationship managers in high-tech industry should make supply chain relationship flexible and interdependent. The limitations of the study are as follows; First, about the research setting, the study was conducted with high-tech industry, in which the direction of the change in the power balance of supply chain dyads is usually determined by manufacturers. So we have a difficulty with generalization. We need to control the power structure between partners in a future study. Secondly, about flexibility, we treated it throughout the paper as positive, but it can also be negative, i.e. violating an agreement or moving, but in the wrong direction, etc. Therefore we need to investigate the multi-dimensionality of flexibility in future research.