Zeitschriftenartikel zum Thema „Online social networks in business – United States“

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, businesses have faced unprecedented challenges when trying to remain open. Because COVID-19 spreads through aerosolized droplets, businesses were forced to distance their services; in some cases, distancing may have involved moving business services online. In this work, we explore digitization strategies used by small businesses that remained open during the pandemic, and survey/interview small businesses owners to understand preliminary challenges associated with moving online. Furthermore, we analyze payments from 400K businesses across Japan, Australia, United States, Great Britain, and Canada. Following initial government interventions, we observe (at minimum for each country) a 47% increase in digitizing businesses compared to pre-pandemic levels, with about 80% of surveyed businesses digitizing in under a week. From both our quantitative models and our surveys/interviews, we find that businesses rapidly digitized at the start of the pandemic in preparation of future uncertainty. We also conduct a case-study of initial digitization in the United States, examining finer relationships between specific government interventions, business sectors, political orientation, and resulting digitization shifts. Finally, we discuss the implications of rapid & widespread digitization for small businesses in the context of usability challenges and interpersonal interactions, while highlighting potential shifts in pre-existing social norms.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine both the Latino/Hispanic entrepreneurs’ social media adoption (SMA) for business purposes and the influence of culture on personal versus business social network platform (SNP) selection. Design/methodology/approach The Technology Acceptance Model’s (TAM) factors of perceived usefulness (PU) and perceived ease of use (PEU) as drivers of Latino/Hispanic entrepreneurs’ social network platform selection are examined as well as the effect of SMA on revenue. Data was collected from 633 small business owners across the United States via an online survey administered in English and Spanish. Findings Results indicate that Latino/Hispanic business owners use personal SNP more than business SNP for business purposes. PU and PEU were not found to predict personal SNP for Latino/Hispanic entrepreneurs. However, for Non-Latino/Hispanics, PU was significant while PEU was marginally significant. Findings for PU and PEU as predictors of business SNP indicate similar results for both Latino/Hispanic and non-Latino/Hispanic entrepreneurs, where only PEU was significant. Finally, there was no relationship between either business or personal SNP and revenue for either Latino/Hispanic or non-Latino/Hispanic entrepreneurs. Practical implications This research provides more insight into Latino/Hispanic entrepreneurs’ self-directed engagement in personal SNP (Facebook) and business SNP (LinkedIn) for business purposes and invites future research in this population to further examine cultural influence and business performance. The findings support the need for Latino/Hispanic entrepreneurs’ strengthening their competency in social media usage to remain competitive, as doing so will enhance their capability for building customer relationships, brand development, and equity financing. Originality/value This investigation 1) examines SMA’s role in Latino/Hispanic small and medium enterprises (SMEs); 2) distinguishes between personal and business social network platforms; 3) investigates TAM’s relevance for Latino/Hispanic entrepreneurs’ use of social media for business; and 4) explores SME social media usage as a predictor of revenue. We seek to provide practitioners with a greater understanding of how they may influence business success and sustainability through better competency development and usage of social media platforms.

The new phenomenon called sharing or collaborative consumption emerged a decade ago and is continuously growing. It creates new possibilities for society, and especially for business, is beneficial for the environment, makes more efficient use of resources, and presents a new competitive business model. The scientific literature lacks a more in-depth analysis of the factors influencing sharing activity growth; therefore, the paper’s authors attempt to fill this gap. The authors aim to identify the factors affecting the use of sharing platforms. To reach the goal, the authors developed a regression model and constructed a list of 71 variables. The study used monthly United States data from January 2017 to June 2020 from the publicly available Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED)and Google trends databases. The comparison to other indexes proves that the proposed index, representing the number of visits to sharing platforms (SEP), is a unique one. The first index allowed us to revise the sharing activity monthly. The authors identified that variables such as wage level, social network users, import level, and personal consumption are critical in affecting the number of visits to sharing platforms. The presented framework could be helpful for practitioners and policymakers analysing the stimulation of sharing or collaborative consumption. It includes indicators representing different areas, such as society, technology, and country, and allows for monthly investigations. Such activity was evident for a long time when online platforms contributed to its wider accessibility. The results help to forecast the number of visits monthly. Sharing is still an emerging area for research; thus, the authors tried to explore the phenomenon of sharing to expand the conceptual level of knowledge.

This paper addresses the question of proselytism as an active practice of shaping other people’s identities. Specifically, it looks at the identity discourse promoted by ethnic Chinese evangelicals and compares it to that of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Both Christian churches proselytise among contemporary transnational migrants from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in Europe, each making use of a sophisticated organisation adapted to the transnational practices of these migrants. Yet while evangelicals promote a transnational ethnic identity quite compatible with the secular discourse of the global Chinese migrant, Jehovah’s Witnesses promote an anti-secular, non-ethnic cosmopolitanism. As a result, global Chinese evangelical ties more easily become part of global migratory and business networks. The paper is based on fieldwork among Chinese evangelical organisations and Jehovah’s Witnesses in Italy, Hungary, Russia, and the United Kingdom, supplemented with interviews in the United States (the headquarters of many Chinese evangelical organisations) and a survey of printed and online resources used in proselytising.

The purpose of the study was to assess how well fashion companies were able to sustain themselves throughout the COVID-19 pandemic by leveraging internet platforms. In spite of the numerous disruptions the fashion industry has experienced as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic's effects on the workplace and the shift in consumer behaviour towards digital platforms, industry stakeholders think that digital platforms offer potential for the industry's revival because many fashion businesses were forced to close during the pandemic. The paper examines and summarises the extent to which digital platforms have been effective in fostering the long-term expansion of fashion companies and their influence on livelihoods in the COVID-19 pandemic, using a narrative literature approach. Based on productive interactions and transactions, digital platforms provide a 21st-century, cost-effective way for businesses to promote themselves. Prior to the pandemic, fashion companies were able to market their goods and services, track live events, keep an eye on trends and projections, and boost their online presence, all of which contributed to increased revenue. Notwithstanding the fact that they continue to face major obstacles that negatively impact the livelihoods of their employees, the study shows how digital platforms have been incredibly effective in helping fashion businesses, especially those in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe, and Asia, to endure and flourish during COVID-19. Although African customers have become accustomed to online shopping and e-commerce, digital platforms have not been especially popular throughout the continent, as fashion designers and businesses have not properly utilised them. In order to promote fashion businesses and designers, governments and policymakers should support the development of digital infrastructure and digital literacy initiatives. Additionally, fashion brands and businesses in the supply chain should improve their knowledge and understanding of how consumers and potential clients communicate and transact in their online networks. Finally, fashion businesses and designers should invest in social media sentiment analysis tools to facilitate effective online visibility, seamless interactions, and transactions with consumers.

This study investigates how culture moderates the interrelationships among social spatial imagery (SSI), consumer xenocentrism (C-XEN), electronic word-of-mouth (eWoM), and overall project performance for global virtual teams (GVTs) in social media networked environments. In a sample of 1240 participants from developed economies (the United States and Italy) versus 1176 from emerging economies (China, India, Colombia, Brazil, and Malaysia), partial least squares structural equation modeling and multigroup analyses were conducted to examine the above social media-based interrelationships. The results indicate that low power distance (PD), individualist, and masculine cultures exert strong and positive relationships between C-XEN and negative eWoM; while high PD, collectivist, and less masculine (or feminine) cultures strengthen positive relationships between xenocentrism and positive eWoM. Further, negative eWoM aids project success for GVTs, while positive eWoM has no impact on project performance for developed and emerging economies. Theoretical and managerial implications for understanding cross-cultural aspects of SSI, C-XEN, eWoM, and GVT project performance in online social networks are discussed.

We propose elements of explanations on the determinants of the act of online purchase by luxury customers from three countries: the United States, the United Kingdom and France. Our research questions are: (1) What weight do cultural factors occupy in the act of buying online, compared to sociodemographic factors? In other words, to what extent would a French luxury customer with the same gender, age and income level as an American customer be less inclined to buy online than in physical stores? (2) How can we characterize these cultural differences? Is this the expression of a different relationship to luxury, different expectations or shopping habits more anchored in a historical context? We explore the reasons why French luxury clients are less likely to shop online than in store, compared to British and American customers. This research can give insights to researchers and practitioners on the behaviour and expectations of different sets of luxury clients in their customer journey. Relying on an exclusive set of customer data, we carry statistical analyses on a global sample of 2036 luxury customers from three countries. Using descriptive statistics and logistic regressions models, we highlight some determinants of online shopping. The influence of the nationality of respondents is statistically established as the second most important factor after consumer’s age. Different purchasing attitudes among countries, with an emphasis put by French clients on emotional dimensions, can explain why an online journey might be less engaging for them. We highlight the necessity to interact in a differentiated way according to the different sociodemographic groups. While social networks are the most common tools used to address the age gap among luxury clients, other functionalities can help to adapt to the expectations of shoppers from different countries. Our research is at the crossroad between cross-cultural studies on luxury shoppers, which did not provide yet an analysis on online customers, and studies dedicated to the specificities of luxury e-commerce which never employed an important international dataset.

Sex work regulation is often debated from the perspective of state control: legalization vs decriminalization, ‘end demand’ vs criminalization. Ultimately, these debates center the State as the most significant arbiter in sex workers’ ability to conduct business. This paper contends that while state legislation has a significant effect on the material lives of sex workers, the terms of service of the US-based, privatized financial industry has a more immediate and widespread affect. Most sex workers make use of online payment applications as well as social media, even though both are highly discriminatory toward sex workers, regardless of the legal status of one’s employment as a sex worker, or even the laws in which the worker conducts their business. Rather than being treated as a luxury or privilege, access to both the worldwide web and the global network of banking are essential rights that enable full participation in contemporary society. Through an analysis of platform governance and revenue chokepoints, this paper argues that payment intermediaries function as an extra-legal regulation of sex work that has a more profound effect on sex workers’ material reality than State legislation, as these intermediaries control how they are able to secure business and be paid for it without having to answer to a voting demographic. Most of the world’s major social media and payment processing applications are based in the United States, which enables it to export the repercussions of the stigmatization and criminalization of sex work even within the boundaries of countries with differing legislation.

Topicality. The relevance of the study is based on the fact that the transport sector of the European Union is at a crossroads today, as it requires a policy that meets the needs of the 21st century and which will contribute to the growth of jobs in the EU. It must avoid constraining mobility, while at the same time responding to a range of social and economic problems that arise. Aim and tasks. The purpose of the article is to develop theoretical, methodological and practical applications, which should justify the optimization of transport services and changes in the design of vehicles and infrastructure of the European Union. In addition, various factors of historical and geographical nature often affect the political merits of States parties. After decades of EU activity, there is currently not a sufficiently compatible and resource saving network of interconnected, trans border transport infrastructure. Reasearch results. The essence of the formation of a united European transport network is the implementation of direct links between the main nodes and the infrastructure that forms the mobility of passengers. Airports, ports, railways, undergrounds and bus stations must increasingly be transformed into multimodal communication platforms for passengers and cargo. Online information, electronic booking and payment systems that combine all vehicles will contribute to multimodal travel. But today legal, administrative and technical barriers multiply and slow down the process of forming a single European transport space. Despite the intensification of rail freight and international passenger transport, access to the transport services market continues to be a serious problem. This is largely due to lack of independence and lack of financial transparency between infrastructure managers and service providers, which can lead to discrimination and distortion of the market. Conclusion. The transport policy of the European Union provides a powerful lever for economic recovery. A new issue for European transport systems is their intermodality, that is, the opportunity for logistic chains to use different consecutive modes of transport according to their specific needs for optimizing costs and environmental impact. This means the implementation of regular, clear efforts at European level country by country, industry by industry, according to different geographical, economic and historical features. An investment strategy in transport infrastructure will make sense only if it is shared by actors in the world market. By means of joint financing of individual objects by business and states, the possibility of creating a single European transport network will be real.

The purpose of the article is to analyze the features of the world experience in the management of e-commerce enterprises as subjects of innovative entrepreneurship and study their content. Methodology. The study used generalizations, comparisons and systematic methods. Results. In the article the specifics of the world experience in the management of e-commerce enterprises as subjects of innovative entrepreneurship are analyzed. The experience of this topic in the leading countries of the world is studied. The list of features of this question is defined. Practical meaning. It is argued that the significant reorientation of world trade to online sales channels due to the impact of quarantine restrictions associated with the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 could significantly affect the real level of sales in 2020, adjusting it upwards. It is noted that the industrial revolution turned agrarian societies into production centers and changed people's work and the standard of living they could expect. The digital revolution has also changed the way people communicate, shop and work. Referring to the experience of e-commerce companies, which are directly affected by the digital transformation on the nature and intensity of their activities in both strategic and operational dimensions, it should be noted that digital business strategies continue to review traditional retail through multichannel capabilities. Prospects for further research. Statistics show that mobile commerce, especially the use of mobile applications, is becoming increasingly important in the development of online sales strategies. Yes, Amazon is the leading mobile application for online stores in the United States. At the same time, Amazon singles out a list of development risks that are quite obvious to all retailers operating in the e-commerce environment, primarily related to the implementation of international transactions, which the author cites in the article. The author gives an example of successful European experience in managing an e-commerce company, namely the company “C&A” – a Belgian-German-Dutch network of retail clothing stores. Also interesting is the Chinese e-commerce platform Aliexpress, the international online platform Alibaba (aliexpress.com), which was launched in 2010, and Taobao, the online platform Alibaba C2C (taobao.com), which was founded in May 2003. It is noted that almost 80% of small and medium enterprises consider sales on social networks as a proven strategy to increase revenue.

Previous research has shown that many college students in the United States post content to social networking sites that they know would be considered inappropriate by employers and other authority figures. However, the phenomenon has not been extensively studied in cross-cultural context. To address this knowledge gap, a survey of college students in Australia, Denmark, the United Kingdom, and the United States was conducted. The study found a universal tendency among the four groups: students knew the content they were posting would be considered inappropriate by employers and other authority figures, but they chose to post it anyway. The article also reports on differences in the way this tendency was manifested and on related aspects of social networking across cultures, including decisions about privacy and information disclosure.

Pharmaceutical serialization is a regulatory compliance that assures a unique identifier assigned to every unit of prescribed medicine. This unique identifier is used for product tracking and authentication in the supply chain. Initially, in 2018, the Drug Supply Chain Security Act (DSCSA) implemented pharmaceutical drug serialization regulations to mitigate the risk of counterfeit medicine entering the US market. Under this regulation, the pharmaceutical drug manufacturer is required to print a 2D data matrix barcode encoded with unique identification on each drug unit. Basically, printing a unique identification code on each prescribed drug for authenticity and traceability is not sufficient to eliminate the risk of drug counterfeiting. Subsequently, criminals and drug counterfeiters can still supply illicit or stolen drugs into the supply chain through an illegal source or online trade by imitating the same information in multiple units. After this regulation's enforcement, we observed that the US market lacks a mechanism to authenticate individual drug units with a centralized, secure repository before dispensing them to patients. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, drug counterfeiters and criminals have produced large quantities of contaminated drugs, which they then distribute through their illicit networks and underground social media platforms. Furthermore, COVID-19 supply chain disruptions, non-business resilience, and the fear of ransomware have all contributed to a rise in the mass fabrication of counterfeit medications. Ultimately, the United States needs a centralized cloud-based database hub where all authorized trading partners should be connected for medicine authentication. In this process, the manufacturer must update the product's unique identifier in the centrally connected hub database before supplying drugs to the market. Further, the dispenser, pharmacy, or hospital should authenticate the unique identifier of the product using the same database before dispensing it to patients. Finally, this process will ensure that patients are getting authenticated medicine and will mitigate the risk of dispensing counterfeit or illegal drugs.

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To improve online learning pedagogy within the field of paralegal education, this study investigated how paralegal students and paralegal instructors perceived the effectiveness of synchronous and asynchronous online paralegal courses. This study intended to inform paralegal instructors and course developers how to better design, deliver, and evaluate effective online course instruction in the field of paralegal studies.Survey results were analyzed using independent samples t-test and correlational analysis, and indicated that overall, paralegal students and paralegal instructors positively perceived synchronous and asynchronous online paralegal courses. Paralegal instructors reported statistically significant higher perceptions than paralegal students: (1) of instructional design and course content in synchronous online paralegal courses; and (2) of technical assistance, communication, and course content in asynchronous online paralegal courses. 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Traditional news outlets, such as newspapers and television, are no longer major sources of news. These media channels have been replaced by social platforms, which have increased in value as information distributors. This change in communication is an underlying reason for the election fraud controversies that occurred in the United States and South Korea, which hold high standards of democracy, during similar periods. This study investigates a model for sharing political disputes over social networks, especially Twitter, and illustrates the influence of political polarization. This study examines Twitter content around the presidential elections in the United States and South Korea in 2020 and 2022, respectively. It applies semantic network analysis and structural topic modeling to describe and compare the dynamics of online discourse on the issue of election fraud. The results show that online spaces such as Twitter serve as public spheres for discussion among active political participants. Social networks are key settings for forming and spreading election fraud controversies in the United States and South Korea, with differences in content. In addition, the study applies large-volume text data and new analytical methods such as the structural topic model to examine the in-depth relationships among political issues in cyberspace.

Abstract These proceedings present the written contributions of the participants of the Seventh International Meeting for Researchers in Materials and Plasma Technology (7th IMRMPT), which was held from 7 to June 9, 2023, at the Cartagena de Indias City, Colombia, organized by the Foundation Of Researchers In Science and Technology Of Materials (FORISTOM); this was the 7th version of biennial meetings that began in 2011. The Journal of Physics: Conference Series (JPCS) proceedings volume consists of 10 contributions that were presented as talks at the conference; the abstracts of all participants’ contributions were published in the Abstract Book with ISSN 2422-3824. The conference website is available at https://foristom.org/7imrmpt/. The scientific program of the 7th IMRMPT consisted of 8 Keynote Lectures and 121 Oral Presentations, with the participation of undergraduate and graduate students, professors, researchers, and entrepreneurs from Colombia, Spain, the United States of America, Mexico, Uruguay, Brazil, among others. Moreover, the objective of IMRMPT is to bring together national and international researchers to strengthen the Materials Science, Engineering, and Nanotechnology Researchers’ Network of scientific cooperation with a global impact to promote the exchange of creative ideas, and the effective transfer of scientific knowledge, from basic research to developing technology or innovation, applied to academic, industrial, energetic, environments, and social solutions to improve our different life forms. All papers in these Proceedings refer to one of the following topics covered in the 7th IMRMPT: New Materials, Structural Integrity, Renewable Energy, Biomedical Coatings, Additive Manufacturing, Online Process Control, Non-Destructive Evaluation, Characterization of Materials, Thin Films and Nanomaterials, Wear and Corrosion/Oxidation, Plasma Applications and Technologies, Modeling, Simulation, and Diagnostics, Education in Materials Science, Engineering, and Technology, Science, Engineering, Technology, and Innovation for Social Inclusion, Surface Modification (Ion Implantation, Ion Nitriding, Magnetron Sputtering, Cathodic Arc, Sol-Gel, Thermal Spray). On behalf of the organizing committee of the 7th IMRMPT, we are incredibly thankful to all authors and participants for providing their valuable contributions to these Proceedings and the reviewers for their constructive recommendations and criticism, aiding in improving the presented articles. Besides, we especially appreciate the excellent support provided by the sponsors and partners for making this new version of the international meeting of researchers possible, allowing us to continue with the dream of strengthening and contributing to research, technological development, and innovation in the present and future of Colombia. On the other hand, it is essential to note that the event organized by the FORISTOM foundation significantly contributes to the national and international scientific community, achieving the universal interaction of the different research groups of Colombia’s academia and business sectors with other countries. Finally, the editor hopes that those interested around Materials and Plasma for Science, Engineering, and Technology can enjoy this reading, of the volume of the JPCS, which reflects a wide variety of current issues. List of Organizing Committee, National Scientific Committee, International Scientific Committee, Invited Speakers, Sponsor, Partners are available in this Pdf.

This study explores how belief in social media outlets is an important aspect of agenda melding in an online environment. In this study, the researchers employ agenda melding as a theoretical lens to explore how belief in social media outlet can predict support for the proposed Border Wall. The researchers surveyed 232 people to find out how belief in media outlet contributes to building an online media agenda in the context of immigration. Social media networks continue to grow in influence when it comes to understanding important political issues and the way they manifest themselves in mainstream United States immigration policy.

This study examined how a group of Korean international students enrolled in a writing class in a United States business programme navigated their literacy practices through the use of KakaoTalk, a social networking application for smartphones. On the basis of 29 student interviews and a detailed narrative of one focal student’s activities in KakaoTalk group sessions, the study aimed to elucidate the less studied feature of literacy studies: the social networking methods that students mobilise to make meaning of their school literacy activities collaboratively and individually. The study findings suggest that students’ identities and literacy performances shape one another through the intersection of local and global forces. Theories of identity and the Korean concept of “in-maek” offer important insights into the dynamic interchange of students’ social and literacy practices and identities. This study provides insights into the influence of such identity work on students’ academic experiences and the development of a curriculum for a business programme writing class.

Social media has been a vital channel for communicating and broadcasting disaster-related information. However, the global spatiotemporal patterns of social media users’ activities, interactions, and connections after a natural disaster remain unclear. Hence, we integrated geocoding, geovisualization, and complex network methods to illustrate and analyze the online social network’s spatiotemporal evolution. Taking the super typhoon Haiyan as a case, we constructed a retweeting network and mapped this network according to the tweets’ location information. The results show that (1) the distribution of in-degree and out-degree follow power-law and retweeting networks are scale-free. (2) A local catastrophe could attract significant global interest but with strong geographical heterogeneity. The super typhoon Haiyan especially attracted attention from the United States, Europe, and Australia, in which users are more active in posting and forwarding disaster-related tweets than other regions (except the Philippines). (3) The users’ interactions and connections are also significantly different between countries and regions. Connections and interactions between the Philippines and the United States, Europe, and Australia were much closer than in other regions. Therefore, the agencies and platforms should also pay attention to other countries and regions outside the disaster area to provide more valuable information for the local people.

The severe impact of COVID-19 in the United States has forced many students to replace in-person socialization with online digital contact. In this study, we investigate the mental health impacts associated with this shift by examining properties of online interactions that may affect loneliness and perceived social support. Students were surveyed (N=827) across 97 universities across the US during their first full semester impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic (Fall 2020). Private online interactions (messaging, phone call, video call) were found to have a comparable correlation to social support as face-to-face interactions, but public online interactions (social media) were associated with more negative outcomes. Among private platforms, messaging had the strongest correlation with social support; and daily self-disclosure over messaging yielded social support levels that were 1.21x higher than rarely or never disclosing over this platform. We speculate that factors such as the level of privacy and peoples' feelings of control contributed to disclosure and perceived social support in online platforms.

As COVID-19-driven lockdowns and social distancing became the new normal in 2020, musicians experienced a reshuffling of their social networks. This article uses in-depth interviews with nine community arts practitioners in Australia, Norway and the United States to explore the impact of COVID-19 on their ability to practise, collaborate and connect with their musical communities. Results showed that, while social distancing has significantly disrupted active connection with localized communities and musical networks, participants reported increased connection and engagement with wider networks through technology. Applying Putnam’s concepts of bonding and bridging capital, the authors posit that COVID-era music engagement has seen a shift towards decentralized communities through an emphasis on bridging capital. Ultimately, however, analysis showed Putnam’s concepts to be unhelpful in describing online music connections, and ‘crystal capital’ is proposed as a possible way to theorize the subjective nature of online music engagement.

COVID-19 profoundly impacted consumer behavior and psychology; this impact is perceived in social habits and shopping changes. Online stores have successfully boosted their sales, to the detriment of retail stores. This article aims to provide statistical analysis and evaluate consumers’ buying behavior by age groups toward retail and online stores for showing recommendations at online store entrepreneurs and retail store owners; thus, optimize costs and have higher sales projections. The methodology used is based on statistical data from various sources and databases such as Statista, United States Census Bureau, and international organizations, contrasted with the information obtained from 314 surveys conducted with consumers in different cities of the United States. In this study, statistical data and surveys upon groups of people were between twenty-two (22) to eighty (80) years old were analyzed. As a result, an increase in online shopping preferences was obtained, where the youngest population group leads the consumption in virtual platforms due to their familiarity with technology. In conclusion, there is a significant increase in online shopping, which is exacerbated by the pandemic.

Social ties play a prominent role in individuals’ political decision-making. They influence partisan defections, political participation, voting decisions, and political information acquisition. Much of the literature focuses on personal social networks or geographically close networks. Yet one’s social network might also include acquaintances or other connections in more distant places that are maintained via online networks. In this study, we exploit Facebook’s Social Connectedness Index, which reflects social connections across the United States, and we investigate the role of social connectedness in political decision-making among individuals who are located across distant geographical regions. Our results suggest that social connectedness between counties has a homogenizing effect on voting for the same presidential candidate, either Democratic or Republican. On the other hand, social connectedness is likely to have a differentiating effect on voting for an independent or a third-party candidate. Moreover, this effect is moderated by the socioeconomic characteristics of the counties, such as education, race, population density, household income, industry, and gender composition.

This paper examines the relationship between the regional variation in social capital in the United States and the propensity and properties of the management earnings forecasts. Social capital refers to connections among individualssocial networks and the norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness that arise from them (Putnam 2000). Using a comprehensive sample of companies in the United States, we find that firms located in region with higher social capital are more likely to issue a management earnings forecast and are inclined to forecast more frequently. In addition, earnings forecasts made by those firms tend to be more specific. Our findings suggest that mangers of firms in the high social capital regions are more likely to be concerned about their reputation of providing transparent information regarding their businesses because of the close connections among individuals and the greater propensities to honor obligations. This study contributes to the accounting literature by identifying a non-financial factor (i.e., social capital) that affects managements voluntary disclosure practices.

Social media has evolved over the last decade to become an important driver for acquiring and spreading information in different domains such as business, entertainment, crisis management, and politics. The increasing popularity of social media raises a number of questions regarding why we use it so much and what aspects influence this activity. What about gender? What about education, income, age or social status? This paper answers some of these questions using statistical analyses and by dividing overall social media use into selected social media, i.e., Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, and Twitter. The analysis used a dataset that contains information related to 2002 respondents from the U.S. and their social media activity. The results show that people with high household incomes and high education use social media the most. As age increases, social media use decreases, while bigger household income means that social media are used more. Overall, understanding where and at what frequency users are on social media can be a key competitive advantage. When using social networks correctly for marketing, companies can significantly improve their brand awareness, customer satisfaction, quality, reach, and profit.

Smartphones and high-speed network connections allow businesses to deliver information to customers faster and more efficiently than ever before. This study analyses the most-cited articles on smartphone online marketing. A bibliometric mapping analysis was used to search for articles related to smartphone online marketing between 2010 and 2020, retrieved from the Scopus database. The title, a number of citations, publishing year, journal, country, subject area, and authors were all recorded and evaluated. VOSviewer was used for the bibliometric study. The search yielded a total of 120 articles, with citation counts ranging from 17 to 225. All of the articles were authored in English. The United States was the region with the most articles published. The highest publication source is the Journal of Business Research. Management, accounting, and business dominated the articles. This study benefits the company and marketers with the marketing strategies used in online marketing with smartphones. In terms of marketing activities and research areas, this study suggests future research directions

From health to education, income impacts a huge range of life choices. Earlier research has leveraged data from online social networks to study precisely this impact. In this paper, we ask the opposite question: do different levels of income result in different online behaviors? We demonstrate it does. We present the first large-scale study of Nextdoor, a popular location-based social network. We collect 2.6 Million posts from 64,283 neighborhoods in the United States and 3,325 neighborhoods in the United Kingdom, to examine whether online discourse reflects the income and income inequality of a neighborhood. We show that posts from neighborhoods with different incomes indeed differ, e.g. richer neighborhoods have a more positive sentiment and discuss crimes more, even though their actual crime rates are much lower. We then show that user-generated content can predict both income and inequality. We train multiple machine learning models and predict both income (R2=0.841) and inequality (R2=0.77).

In this article, we study the various functions of online cybercriminal meeting places from a unique perspective: We do not take the criminal meeting place as a starting point, but the users—the criminal networks. This allows not only for a view of what is happening on online meeting places, but it also places online meeting places into perspective. Our data consisted of detailed case descriptions of 40 cybercriminal networks active in the Netherlands (18), Germany (3), the United Kingdom (9), and the United States (10). Reconstructions were made based on analysis of police files and/or interviews with case officers and public prosecutors. Online meeting places play a role in the majority of our cases: to meet co-offenders, to buy tools, or to sell data. However, from a crime script perspective, the role of forums is much more modest. Forums, for example, can be used to find suitable co-offenders, but in the majority of our cases the core members did not meet at forums. Offline meeting places still play an important role in cybercriminal networks. Furthermore, forums can be viewed as online versions of offline offender convergence settings—physical locations such as a bar—where criminals can meet, and ensure continuity and structure. However, forums might be more accessible than physical criminal meeting places. For a curious newbie, it is, for example, easier to visit all sorts of forums than it is to visit all sorts of criminal bars. Finally, our cases show that the learning function of forums should not be underestimated.

AbstractThis article explores the relationship between headcovering and women's political participation through an original online survey of 1,917 Muslim-American women. As a visible marker of religious group identity, wearing the headscarf can orient the integration of Muslim women into the American political system via its impact on the openness of their associational life. Our survey respondents who cover are more likely to form insular, strong ties with predominantly Muslim friend networks, which decreased their likelihood of voting and affiliating with a political party. Interestingly, frequency of mosque attendance across both covered and uncovered respondents is associated with a higher probability of political participation, an effect noted in other religious institutions in the United States. Yet, mosque attendance can simultaneously decrease the political engagement of congregants if they are steered into exclusively religious friend groups. This discovery reveals a tension within American Muslim religious life and elaborates on the role of religious institutions vs. social networks in politically mobilizing Muslim-Americans.

Abstract United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) drinking water violation report is currently one of the most reliable measures of evaluating United States drinking water quality. While states continuously strive to comply with federal water quality standards making this documentation continuously relevant, consumers are likely to perceive water quality through sensory aesthetics or physical and virtual social networks. This research quantifies the relationship between consumer perceptions and government-reported drinking water quality to provide insights to state water managers and policymakers. We evaluated consumer perceptions of tap water using weekly social media data. The online search returned 898,709 mentions and 799,035 posts. Net sentiment, measured as the number of negative posts minus the number of positive posts divided by the number of posts expressing sentiment, was determined and ranged from −100 to 100. Net sentiment was uncorrelated with USEPA weekly water quality violations for most states. Net sentiment was correlated with violations related to arsenic standards (−0.223) and a total number of violations (−0.220) for Washington. For California, net sentiment was correlated with violations related to disinfectants and other organic compounds (−0.295). In many cases, water violations in one city became national news, which eclipsed local water issues circulating on social media.

Social networks can shape many aspects of social and economic activity: migration and trade, job-seeking, innovation, consumer preferences and sentiment, public health, social mobility, and more. In turn, social networks themselves are associated with geographic proximity, historical ties, political boundaries, and other factors. Traditionally, the unavailability of large-scale and representative data on social connectedness between individuals or geographic regions has posed a challenge for empirical research on social networks. More recently, a body of such research has begun to emerge using data on social connectedness from online social networking services such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter. To date, most of these research projects have been built on anonymized administrative microdata from Facebook, typically by working with coauthor teams that include Facebook employees. However, there is an inherent limit to the number of researchers that will be able to work with social network data through such collaborations. In this paper, we therefore introduce a new measure of social connectedness at the US county level. Our Social Connectedness Index is based on friendship links on Facebook, the global online social networking service. Specifically, the Social Connectedness Index corresponds to the relative frequency of Facebook friendship links between every county-pair in the United States, and between every US county and every foreign country. Given Facebook’s scale as well as the relative representativeness of Facebook’s user body, these data provide the first comprehensive measure of friendship networks at a national level.

Sentiment analysis is widely used to retrieve the hidden sentiments in medical discussions over Online Social Networking platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram. People often tend to convey their feelings concerning their medical problems over social media platforms. Practitioners and health care workers have started to observe these discussions to assess the impact of health-related issues among the people. This helps in providing better care to improve the quality of life. Dementia is a serious disease in western countries like the United States of America and the United Kingdom, and the respective governments are providing facilities to the affected people. There is much chatter over social media platforms concerning the patients’ care, healthy measures to be followed to avoid disease, check early indications. These chatters have to be carefully monitored to help the officials take necessary precautions for the betterment of the affected. A novel Feature engineering architecture that involves feature-split for sentiment analysis of medical chatter over online social networks with the pipeline is proposed that can be used on any Machine Learning model. The proposed model used the fuzzy membership function in refining the outputs. The machine learning model has obtained sentiment score is subjected to fuzzification and defuzzification by using the trapezoid membership function and center of sums method, respectively. Three datasets are considered for comparison of the proposed and the regular model. The proposed approach delivered better results than the normal approach and is proved to be an effective approach for sentiment analysis of medical discussions over online social networks.

This issue of Learning and Teaching: The International Journal of Higher Education in the Social Sciences includes authors from China, Canada, France and the United States. The first two articles analyse processes of developing international partnerships and networks promoting refugee access to higher education. The other three papers concern aspects of teaching and learning: online learning in accountancy; a flipped pedagogy in sociology; and the inclusion of national history in introductory international relations courses.

As the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) continues to rage worldwide, the United States has become the most affected country, with more than 34.1 million total confirmed cases up to 1 June 2021. In this work, we investigate correlations between online social media and Internet search for the COVID-19 pandemic among 50 U.S. states. By collecting the state-level daily trends through both Twitter and Google Trends, we observe a high but state-different lag correlation with the number of daily confirmed cases. We further find that the accuracy measured by the correlation coefficient is positively correlated to a state’s demographic, air traffic volume and GDP development. Most importantly, we show that a state’s early infection rate is negatively correlated with the lag to the previous peak in Internet searches and tweeting about COVID-19, indicating that earlier collective awareness on Twitter/Google correlates with a lower infection rate. Lastly, we demonstrate that correlations between online social media and search trends are sensitive to time, mainly due to the attention shifting of the public.

<i>Social distancing requirements resulted in many people working from home in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic. The topic of working from home was often discussed in the media and online during the pandemic, but little was known about how quality of life (QOL) and remote working interfaced. The purpose of this study was to describe QOL while working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic. The novel topic, unique methodological approach of the General Online Qualitative Study (D’Abundo &amp; Franco, 2022a), and the strategic Social Distancing Sampling (D’Abundo &amp; Franco, 2022c) resulted in significant participation throughout the world (n = 709). The United States subset of participants (n = 169) is the focus of this article. This big qual (Brower et al., 2019), large qualitative study (n &gt;100) included the principal investigator-developed open-ended, online questionnaire entitled the “Quality of Life Home Workplace Questionnaire (QOLHWQ),” and demographic questions. Data were collected from July to September 2020 (during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic). Data analysis included open coding and categorical analysis resulting in the categories of positive, negative, both positive and negative, and neutral experiences with QOL while working from home. More participants cited increased QOL due to having more free time, less stress, and less commuting to work. The most cited issue associated with negative QOL was social isolation. As the post-peak era of the COVID-19 pandemic continues and the potential for future public health emergencies requiring social distancing exists, the findings from this study provide an important baseline understanding of remote working in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic. As working from home either full-time or part-time becomes more common, implications of this research are likely applicable beyond the era of the COVID-19 pandemic. To promote QOL and work-life balance for employees working remotely in the United States, stakeholders may want to develop social support networks and create effective planning initiatives to prevent social isolation and maximize the benefits of remote working experiences for both employees and organizations.</i>

So-called ‘fake news’—deceptive online content that attempts to manipulate readers—is a growing problem. A tool of intelligence agencies, scammers and marketers alike, it has been blamed for election interference, public confusion and other issues in the United States and beyond. This problem is made particularly pronounced as younger generations choose social media sources over journalistic sources for their information. This paper considers the prospective solution of providing consumers with ‘nutrition facts’-style information for online content. To this end, it reviews prior work in product labeling and considers several possible approaches and the arguments for and against such labels. Based on this analysis, a case is made for the need for a nutrition facts-based labeling scheme for online content.

This project illuminates what data youth believe online advertisers and social media companies collect about them. We situate these findings within the context of current advertising regulations and compare youth beliefs with what data social media companies report collecting based on their privacy policies. Through interviews with 21 youth ages 10-17 in the United States, we learn that participants are largely aware of how their interactions on the website or app are used to inform personalized content. However, certain types of information like geolocation or how long data is retained is less clear to them. We also learn about what school and family factors influence youth to adopt apps and websites. This work has implications for design and policy related to companies' personal data collection and targeted advertising, especially for youth.

Current labour legislation does not contain prescriptions that would guarantee employees the right to privacy, but such legal regulation has long existed abroad, which can be valuable for Ukraine in order to accumulate the best global experience in ensuring the protection of employee privacy. In the US, employee privacy encompasses two aspects: first, the employee's right not to disclose personal information to his employer, and second, the employee's right to personal autonomy, or so to speak, sovereignty in certain life decisions. In many important aspects, these two forms of privacy are quite different from each other, but within the scope of labour law, the right not to disclose certain personal information and the right to personal autonomy is still conceptually united by the obligation to ensure the employee's privacy at the workplace. In other words, such autonomy implies that the employer must know about its employees and control what the employees do, but only within the framework of the employment relationship, and only that information that characterizes them as professionals. When the employer tries to use its authority outside the employment relationship by asking about the employee's private life or trying to control this private life, we have a violation of the principle of the employee's sphere of autonomy and, therefore, an unacceptable abuse of the employer's authority. In this age of email and social media, more and more of an employee's personal life is online. However, when dealing with an employer-employee relationship, it is not considered acceptable to ask an employer to provide personal mail or other private information from current or prospective employees. Under state laws, employees can widely share personal information online while keeping it safe from their employers having access to that information. An employee's life can remain private, that is, confidential to the employer while being public to others if the employee wishes to disclose certain personal information. US law allows employees to keep their personal information from employers confidential, including information shared on social networks. In addition, a number of US regulations allow employees to protect their online activity from employers as confidential information, as well as the privacy of employees' financial information.

Parents posting photos and other information about children on social media is increasingly common and a recent source of controversy. We investigated characteristics that predict parental sharing behavior by collecting information from 493 parents of young children in the United States on self-reported demographics, social media activity, parenting styles, children's social media engagement, and parental sharing attitudes and behaviors. Our findings indicate that most social media active parents share photos of their children online and feel comfortable doing so without their child's permission. The strongest predictor of parental sharing frequency was general social media posting frequency, suggesting that participants do not strongly differentiate between "regular" photo-sharing activities and parental sharing. Predictors of parental sharing frequency include greater social media engagement, larger social networks with norms encouraging parental sharing, more permissive and confident parenting styles, and greater social media engagement by their children. Contrasting previous research that often highlights benefits of parental sharing, our findings point to a number of risky online behaviors associated with parental sharing not previously uncovered. Implications for children's privacy and early social media exposure are discussed, including future directions for influencing parental sharing attitudes and behaviors.

In Indonesia, as well as in the United States, franchise system is used as business expansion strategy for Small Medium Enterprises. In the year 2012, there are 1.700 franchise-format companies. It means that the franchise-format business has significant impact to Indonesia economic. Recently, franchisors are looking the appropriate marketing channels in order to increase their number of outlets. This paper data based on a survey in Jakarta on a 3-days December 2013 Franchise and Business Opportunities Expo with 82 respondents of franchise exhibition visitors (prospective franchisees) and 27 franchise exhibitors (franchisors). Half of this exhibition was followed by some franchisors and the others exhibitors sold products non-business opportunity. By using t-test and qualitative comparison, will be compared the answer from franchisors and franchisees. The objective of this paper is to see the ways of online marketing channel offer by franchisors are absorbed or not by prospective franchisees or investors.

Utilizing a survey of defense contractors in the New England region, this study explores the effect of social networks on business performance—measured by annual employment growth and market diversification—during a time when defense spending in the United States was contracting. In contrast to prevailing literature focusing on entrepreneurial firms, this study offers insights on how social networks function in defense contractors, which tend to be mature firms. The main conclusion is that having more network connections is associated with faster short-term employment growth (from 2014 to 2015) for defense contractors, but there is a limit to that benefit. The analysis also shows that social networks do not aid market diversification for defense contractors. This poses an interesting challenge for defense contractors, as they need to balance the priorities of short-term growth and long-term success.

The article analyses the stages of information confrontation in social networks aimed at transforming protest activity from a virtual space into real life in the form of street actions and practical actions to change the current socio-political situation. The author considers one of the critical threats of social media to the socio-political stability of society the attempts of using them to influence changes in the collective psychology, motivation and behaviour of citizens. The author gives examples of the IT industry and government agencies of the United States, whose cooperation provides the United States with unprecedented opportunities to influence the global information space and analyses the experience and methodology of political mobilisation of the masses in social networks during the events of the Facebook revolution in Egypt 2010–2011. Based on the understanding of the real experience, the author identifies the stages and methods of reformatting virtual protest activity in the real one, as well as identifies the biographical features of the leaders of online protest movements and proposes measures to counteract the information threats of social media. According to the author, one of the most effective mechanisms to counter the threats of social media is the implementation of a comprehensive state identity policy focused on maintaining and developing the existing pivot points of the consensus collective national identity of the society.

This work analyses the presence and management As personalized digital networks have increased in cultural and political relevance, there is a more urgent need to understand their role in democratic memory-formation. Moreover, scholars have suggested that, in a globalized digitalized age, collective memory could extend to transnational publics. This study aims to advance the understanding of memory on global social networks by investigating the way the death of George Floyd in the summer of 2020 was treated and understood by Twitter-users outside the United States. Using a combination of big data and contemporaneous qualitative interviews with users in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, the paper brings the concept of cosmopolitan memory into the social media era. The study finds that users fused the event and its aftermath with observations of injustice in their own countries. However, this process operated differently among users of different ideological outlooks. Another key finding is that users on the radical right resented the uptake of the event as a cosmopolitan memory, and employed techniques termed as “combative counter-memory”.

The management of innovative work in high-technology fields has been a “hot” topic in recent years. In fields such as innovation management, product development, organization design, corporate strategy, economic sociology, organizational economics, engineering management, and knowledge management, scholars have examined subjects ranging from the sociology of creativity to the boundaries of firms in networked industries. They have remarked on the implications of contingent work, outsourcing, globalization, and the demise of the one-company career in studies concerned with issues from regional and national competitiveness to the evolution of labor markets and the social contract. Authors of articles and books published by the popular business press have trumpeted “nimble” and “virtual” organizational forms required by unprecedented conditions, and authors of scholarly essays have addressed the management of relentless change, the option-based valuation of interfirm networks, and knowledge in relation to organizational boundaries.

The mass media helps the community with one of its information demands. Information can be accessed by the public through mass communication channels like print, electronic, and online media. People from different nations can access information at a location that is hard to go to fast and easily using online media. similar to one of the circumstances of George Floyd's passing on May 25, 2020 in Minneapolis, United States. George Floyd is a very hot issue in a variety of internet media, including social media, because of how quickly and easily one may access online media. The purpose of this study is to ascertain how the online news source CNN Indonesia.com presents the story about the racism controversy surrounding the American death of George Floyd (28 May-29 June 2020). The theory of Media Reality Construction and Reporting is applied in this study. Purposive sampling was employed in this study along with Robert N. Entman's framing model analytical methodology. First, the study finding indicates that racism is still pervasive in America. Second, the Trump administration has not done the best job of maximizing support for eradicating racism in the United States. Third, racism still exists in Hollywood, the country's main film business. Keywords: online media, the construct of media, framing, racism, Entman

In preparing my talk for a panel on “Whiteness and Technoculture” for the Society for the Social Study of Science in Boston, I wanted to think about the relationship of my research on the technocultures of the online pornography industry to the events in Charlottesville, which occurred only weeks earlier. Two trends within the online pornography industry came immediately to mind. The first is the aesthetic of “white innocence” as sexual fantasy that reveals a cultural conversation between the mainstream gay pornography industry and white nationalism in the United States. The second is the emergence of affiliate networks that aim to curate content for “unique male viewers” because the internet is, curiously, awash in “female-focused” content. Both of these phenomena seem particularly relevant at a time when white fragility, toxic masculinity, “men’s rights,” and xenophobia have been given explicit approval by the newly elected U.S. President, Donald Trump. These forces have long defined the United States, but they also reveal the way in which this presidency is uniquely awful and dangerous.

In preparing my talk for a panel on “Whiteness and Technoculture” for the Society for the Social Study of Science in Boston, I wanted to think about the relationship of my research on the technocultures of the online pornography industry to the events in Charlottesville, which occurred only weeks earlier. Two trends within the online pornography industry came immediately to mind. The first is the aesthetic of “white innocence” as sexual fantasy that reveals a cultural conversation between the mainstream gay pornography industry and white nationalism in the United States. The second is the emergence of affiliate networks that aim to curate content for “unique male viewers” because the internet is, curiously, awash in “female-focused” content. Both of these phenomena seem particularly relevant at a time when white fragility, toxic masculinity, “men’s rights,” and xenophobia have been given explicit approval by the newly elected U.S. President, Donald Trump. These forces have long defined the United States, but they also reveal the way in which this presidency is uniquely awful and dangerous.

Social media is a viable marketing and communication option for small businesses as it is cost-effective and easy to use. This study explores how small business owners in the artisan economy utilize social media to communicate with their customers. Artisan small businesses share similarities with small firms in other sectors, but they face unique challenges. Five artisan owners in the United States participated in semistructured interviews answering questions relating to marketing and communication. Artisan owners work in home-based businesses and rarely interact with customers in-person. Social media is a primary communication tool. Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are sites artisan owners utilize to connect with existing and previous customers. Social media is helpful in maintaining customer relationships as well as reaching out to potential clients. When customers interact with artisan owners on social media such as liking and sharing posts, word-of-mouth marketing is created. Social media might help artisan owners increase customer loyalty and sales.

United States federal agencies fund research to promote discovery and innovation. Most agencies require collaboration because teams promote productivity to a greater degree than singular researchers. However, the functionality and productivity of collaboration is poorly understood. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the collaborative structure of a federally funded entomology research team to determine the characteristics of the network structure and its impact on research collaboration using social network analysis (SNA) methodology. An online survey and interviews were used to collect data. The theories of social network, strong and weak ties, and scientific collaboration were employed to determine the degree of collaboration among team members. We found a low density pattern of collaboration that was associated with: (a) a centralized pattern, (b) the presence of sub-teams functioning like sub-networks, and (c) the presence of less interactive members. Our results confirm that the SNA approach was useful for evaluating network collaboration with innovative indicators to assess the dynamics of scientific collaboration. The study was limited by non-response. Future research should focus on collecting SNA data longitudinally of the whole network to determine how networking structure and benefits evolves over time, and how strong and weak ties impact scientific discovery.