Business Information Systems - Journal Articles

Permanent URI for this collection

Browse

Recent Submissions

Now showing 1 - 5 of 73
  • Item
    Teaching tip: Embedding sustainability in information systems design education
    (ISCAP, Information Systems and Computing Academic Professionals,, 2024) Rowan, Wendy; McCarthy, Stephen; Mebrahtu, Selam; Gauche, Christophe; O'Reilly, Kate; Odili, Damilola; University College Cork
    Sustainability refers to the achievement of present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. While prior research has highlighted the potential of Information Systems (IS) to support sustainability objectives - for instance, through supporting eco-efficient work practices and democratising healthcare access - our understanding of how to integrate the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a core aspect of IS teaching and curricula remains nascent. This teaching tip presents a pedagogical design and teaching method for embedding sustainability in systems design education using design thinking and ‘active learning’ techniques. We provide examples of how students translated the SDGs into design concepts that target real-world sustainability problems with feedback from subject matter experts. Recommendations are then provided for supporting students’ experiential journeys when exploring sustainability objectives in the classroom by providing opportunities for variation and experimentation.
  • Item
    Control enactment in context: Understanding the interaction of controlee and controller perceptions in inter‐organisational project teams
    (John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2023-03-18) McCarthy, Stephen; O'Raghallaigh, Paidi; Li, Yuzhu; Adam, Frédéric
    Control is necessary for aligning the actions of management (i.e., controllers) and subordinates (i.e., controlees) around common goals. The enactment of control often fails in practice; however, as controlee perceptions may not match those of controllers, leading to a myriad of possible outcomes. Through an interpretive case study of two inter‐organisational IT projects, we reveal how controlees' appraisals and responses to controls are context‐dependent and play out across multiple levels (e.g., personal, professional, project and organisational contexts). We build on a coping perspective of IS controls to theorise the ‘coping strategies’ that controlees pursued relevant to these contexts and the ‘coping routes’ followed when combining different consecutive coping strategies. We find the process need not end with the selection of a single strategy but can potentially continue as both the controller and controlees make ongoing readjustments. While Behavioural Control Theory traditionally assumes the presence of a single control hierarchy, interorganisational IT projects are multi‐level entities that amalgamate different structures and cultures. Our study moves beyond the existing assumptions of Behavioural Control Theory to discuss how a controller's choice of activities shapes the salience of different contexts in controlee appraisals.
  • Item
    Examining the relationship between consumers’ food-related actions, wider pro-environmental behaviours, and food waste frequency: A case study of the more conscious consumer
    (MDPI, 2023-02-01) Marwood, Stephanie; Byrne, Noreen; McCarthy, Olive; Heavin, Ciara; Barlow, Peter
    The implications of food waste extend to the environment, society, and the economy. In the Global North, consumers’ food waste contributes significantly to the current global levels, with action and practice largely driving this contribution. The resulting policies largely centre around raising awareness amongst consumers. However, awareness is not always found to lead to action, resulting in what is termed the ‘value-action gap’. Thus, the focus of this study is on consumers who have demonstrated awareness and knowledge of food waste issues in their willingness to take part in a home food growing campaign. This sample allows us to examine how consumers can be moved beyond awareness and encouraged towards action. This study investigates the actions and practices of consumers that contribute to the likelihood of wasting food while also exploring the relationship between wider pro-environmental behaviour and food waste in the context of social practice theory. Quantitative analysis of survey data (n = 1106) shows that growing food and composting decrease the likelihood of wasting food, supporting a shift in mindset surrounding how food is viewed and reducing the disconnect between consumers and food that is prevalent in modern society. Overall engagement in wider pro-environmental behaviours was found to decrease an individual’s likelihood of wasting food. A layered policy approach with a practices perspective is suggested, with recommendations proposed for interventions and initiatives at individual, community, and broader societal levels.
  • Item
    Scientific authorship in DSS research: Past trends and future opportunities
    (Springer Nature Ltd., 2023-05-18) Keenan, Peter B.; Heavin, Ciara
    Over a period of almost 60 years, Decision Support Systems (DSS) research has focused on supporting managerial decision-making, drawing on contributions from diverse fields including Economics, Operations Research/Management Science (OR/MS), Information Systems (IS), and Management. To better understand the DSS landscape, this article uses a bibliometric analysis to investigate current publishing trends in DSS as a research area, co-authorship by gender, and location. By leveraging Scopus, we identify notable patterns and developments in DSS research authorship from 2018 to 2022. We present initial recommendations to guide the future research efforts of both DSS academics and practitioners.
  • Item
    The dark side of digitalization and social media platform governance: a citizen engagement study
    (Emerald, 2023-01-09) McCarthy, Stephen; Rowan, Wendy; Mahony, Carolanne; Vergne, Antoine
    Purpose: Social media platforms are a pervasive technology that continues to define the modern world. While social media has brought many benefits to society in terms of connection and content sharing, numerous concerns remain for the governance of social media platforms going forward, including (but not limited to) the spread of misinformation, hate speech and online surveillance. However, the voice of citizens and other non-experts is often missing from such conversations in information systems literature, which has led to an alleged gap between research and the everyday life of citizens. Design/methodology/approach: The authors address this gap by presenting findings from 16 h of online dialog with 25 citizens on social media platform governance. The online dialog was undertaken as part of a worldwide consultation project called “We, the internet”, which sought to provide citizens with a voice on a range of topics such as “Digitalization and Me,” “My Data, Your Data, Our Data” and “A Strong Digital Public Sphere.” Five phases of thematic analysis were undertaken by the authors to code the corpus of qualitative data. Findings: Drawing on the Theory of Communicative Action, the authors discuss three dialogical processes critical to citizen discourse: lifeworld reasoning, rationalization and moral action. The findings point toward citizens’ perspectives of current and future issues associated with social media platform governance, including concerns around the multiplicity of digital identities, consent for vulnerable groups and transparency in content moderation. The findings also reveal citizens’ rationalization of the dilemmas faced in addressing these issues going forward, including tensions such as digital accountability vs data privacy, protection vs inclusion and algorithmic censorship vs free speech. Originality/value: Based on outcomes from this dialogical process, moral actions in the form of policy recommendations are proposed by citizens and for citizens. The authors find that tackling these dark sides of digitalization is something too important to be left to “Big Tech” and equally requires an understanding of citizens’ perspectives to ensure an informed and positive imprint for change.