Comparing the Effects of E-Government and Social Media Use on Trust in Government: Evidence from Seoul,South Korea

This study examines how citizens’ use of government social media accounts and e-government websites relate to perceptions of government trustworthiness. We hypothesize that greater use of e-government websites for information by citizens is negatively associated with perceptions of government trustworthiness, whereas greater use of government social media accounts is positively associated with perceptions of government trustworthiness. We investigate these hypotheses using data from a 2012 sample of 1,100 Seoul citizens. In general, the findings offer support for our hypotheses yet also indicate that some dimensions of government trustworthiness are more intransigent than others. This paper concludes by discussing implications for theory and practice.     

Leadership in the Twitterverse

Millions of people, businesses, and organizations are using Twitter. Because of the connection Twitter offers, leadership is emerging through this social media outlet. However, in this time of instant connection, it is important to examine how business leaders are influencing their followers when it comes to tweeting. The purpose of the current study was to discover what business leaders are tweeting about. In order to develop an understanding of the content of the tweets from the top four business leaders on Twitter, the researchers completed a content analysis.     

A multilevel leadership process framework of performance management

Performance management is a critical human resource management practice intended to facilitate performance and development in organizations. Unfortunately, recent discourse among researchers and practitioners suggest that current performance management practices in organizations are less than satisfactory and not effective. A popular recommendation to improve the performance management process is to focus less on the formal procedures and more on the manager-employee interactions embedded in the process. However, current models of performance management do not reflect this focus on social processes. We present a multilevel leadership process framework of performance management that highlights the pivotal role of managers. Within this framework managers carry out this process through their influence on employees, teams, and the organization. Recommendations for future directions are also provided.     

Leadership Education Across Disciplines: The Social Science Perspective

The current article makes a distinction between pedagogical delivery and “disciplinary foundations” in our approaches to leadership studies. Although the liberal arts are helpful in the delivery of leadership content in the classroom, it is argued that the content, at its core, remains a social science enterprise. Therefore, leadership programs should help students understand how leadership works as a social phenomenon. The current article shows how the McDonough curriculum moves students beyond leadership training (with its focus on skill building), using a social science–based working definition of leadership. Leadership education provides the opportunity to organize the curriculum using the social science lenses. By moving the focus away from the leader and examining instead the complex interaction of multiple components, a deeper understanding of how leadership works under different contexts, influenced by a variety of societal norms and values can be obtained.     

Formulating Hypotheses Graphically in Social Research

This article explores the proposition that the appropriate use of suitable forms of graphic communication can improve the formulation and presentation of hypotheses in quantitative social science research. The creative nature of scientific diagrams is discussed and the technological advances in computer graphic media are seen as part of a visual revolution which is markedly changing not only the way we see things but also the way we think and do things today. Brief historical views on the use of hypotheses and diagrammatic languages in science are given. The restricted use of graphic communication tools in social research academic documents is discussed and the importance of using well-designed data graphics in the production and transmission of scientific knowledge is highlighted. Hypotheses are conceptualised and their importance within social research is emphasised. A methodological approach for formulating hypotheses graphically is proposed based on the use of three types of language: notation, statement (ordinary language) and diagram. Some criteria are suggested for the selection of diagram type dependent on the related variables. Several examples are given covering the different models proposed.     

A statistical procedure for testing social reciprocity at group,dyadic and individual levels

This paper examines statistical analysis of social reciprocity, that is, the balance between addressing and receiving behaviour in social interactions. Specifically, it focuses on the measurement of social reciprocity by means of directionality and skew-symmetry statistics at different levels. Two statistics have been used as overall measures of social reciprocity at group level: the directional consistency and the skew-symmetry statistics. Furthermore, the skew-symmetry statistic allows social researchers to obtain complementary information at dyadic and individual levels. However, having computed these measures, social researchers may be interested in testing statistical hypotheses regarding social reciprocity. For this reason, it has been developed a statistical procedure, based on Monte Carlo sampling, in order to allow social researchers to describe groups and make statistical decisions.     

Plausibility,not science,has dominated public discussions of the COVID pandemic

COVID-19 put to the test the understanding of the meaning of “science” by the medical profession, the media, and the public. Unfortunately, the vast majority of individuals were misled by those who spoke on behalf of science but who confused plausible stories with scientific explanation. Scientific understanding comes from theories, which generate hypotheses, which are, in turn, confirmed or disconfirmed by empirical evidence that is evaluated using statistical methods. In our daily lives, we may judge the validity of a hypothesis based on its plausibility, and for most trivial cases that is sufficient. But it is a mistake to imagine that science can proceed on that basis. Yet, scientists themselves are often confused about the foundations of the scientific method. “Evidence-based medicine” is now being used to discredit all medical evidence other than randomized controlled trials (RCTs), the supposed “gold standard” of medical research. This insistence on a single method that is deemed “best practice” has the ironic effect of replacing science with plausibility in medicine. RCTs fail to live up to their vaunted status because of frequent insufficiencies in randomization related to confounding errors and their magnitudes. When randomized trials were compared with observational studies in a meta-analysis of thousands of studies, the differences in conclusions were negligible. The entire framework of COVID-19 policy has been based on plausible hypotheses, not backed by genuine scientific evidence. Critics are correct in claiming that COVID-19 policies have been based on politics, not science.     

Social Networks and Prestige Attainment

A bstract Several hypotheses are derived that relate social networks to the occupational prestige attainment process. These hypotheses are evaluated using theoretically derived indicators and ordinary least squares regression. Most of the hypotheses considered in this paper do not receive support, and the one hypothesis that does lacks a consistent theoretical explanation. From this analysis, I draw two important conclusions: First, the relationship between the prestige of a social network contact and prestige attainment may be empirically strong, but the theoretical explanation linking them lacks consistency. Secondly, empirical work performed to test social network theories should no longer focus on dyadic-data alone. The broader implications of these conclusions for future research are considered.     

The influence of organizational context on the managerial turnover–performance relationship

This study performs a comprehensive examination of organizational context in the relationship between managerial turnover and organizational performance. Using theoretical frameworks of human and social capital, we focus on the moderating roles of entity size, employment system, industry brand, and location. To test our hypotheses, we worked with the company records of a multinational fashion retail group with more than 4,000 stores grouped into eight different brands and 100,000 employees in more than 31 countries. To estimate the causal contextual effects of the relationship between voluntary managerial turnover and organizational performance, we designed a quasi-experiment using propensity score matching analysis. Our results show that the dysfunctional side of managerial turnover is significant for stores that are large, for stores managed under a primary employment system, for brands operating with higher levels of service orientation, and for countries with more restrictive employment protection legislation. We discuss the implications of these findings for practice and for future research.     

All Bachelors are Unmarried Men (p < 0.05)

This paper adds to the list of criticisms against null hypothesis significance testing (NHST). I argue that when researchers do not analyze the conceptual relations among their variables, they may fail to distinguish between logical implications and empirical relations. It does not make sense to use significance testing on hypotheses involving conceptually related phenomena. The widespread lack of conceptual clarification also leads to very small effect sizes in psychology because it causes study participants to understand the stimulus material in different ways. Therefore, they answer in an inconsistent way. Researchers show an extremely low degree of ambition when they seek to show that psychological phenomena differ from chance, or when they try to disprove a hypothesis claiming that a psychological phenomenon does not exist. I see significance testing as a poor solution to the problem of tiny effect sizes in psychology. I recommend that psychological researchers be more explicit both about their main hypotheses and their auxiliary hypotheses. As examples, I analyse all quantitative articles in Issue 1, 2005 of the Journal of Health Psychology.     

高校人文社会科学项目中青年研究者分布和影响的聚类分析

随着青年研究者在人文社会科学研究项目中的申报和立项数不断增加,对他们的研究力分布和影响的分析非常重要。本文在教育部人文社科研究项目申报和立项数据的基础上,运用聚类分析的方法,从地区、高校类型分析了青年研究者的分布和影响,并给出了相关的结论和建议。     

Replicating Text: The Cumulation of Knowledge in Social Science

Obtaining a statistically significant result does not necessarily tell us whether we would obtain significant results in other, similar studies, particularly if the original sample sizes were small. This is why we are supposed to replicate experiments. The present study concerns social science events that cannot be repeated by virtue of their being historically situated. Among social science events, many textual data are datable and, by definition, unrepeatable. One solution to this quandary lies in bootstrap replications, which are based on the original data. A case in point is that of founding political speeches such as those that buoy the European construction. We analyze and compare 82 speeches made by President Delors over the period 1988–1994, and 28 by President Santer over the period 1995–1997. We have all these speeches (N = 110) concorded as to which words are used, how often, where, and when, with the help of a computer-aided content analysis package. We then test various hypotheses using replication bootstrap estimates, that is, by replicating the original sample a large number of times and recreating several thousand samples from the population so created.     

Use of dimensional analysis in social science research

Dimensional analysis is a branch of applied mathematics which is only now beginning to emerge as an important methodology in social and behavioral science research. Unlike regression analysis, dimensional analysis “discovers” the functional relationship in the data from the denned dimensions; hence its ability to extend regression analysis in developing predictive models makes it particularly useful in social science research. In addition, many of the limitations with the use of regression analysis in social science which limit its usefulness in applications, such as multicollinearity, normality assumptions, homoscedasticity assumptions, etc. are not limitations in dimensional analysis. In this study, the application of dimensional analysis to the study of population migrations, specifically white flight in a large urban school district, is presented. Finally, a review of relevant literature and the use of dimensional analysis in other social science areas are presented.     

How Useful Are the Strategic Tools We Teach in Business Schools?

Strategic tools are indispensible for business and competitive analysis. Yet we know very little about managers' internal logic as they put these tools into practical use. We situate our study in a business school context using action learning prior to the manifestation of practice to complement our understanding of practice. Using Personal Construct Theory and Repertory Grids, our mid‐range theorizing showed that, contrary to current thinking about strategic tools, managers think in dualities (often paradoxically) and have a preference for multiple‐tools‐in‐use, tools that provide different perspectives, peripheral vision, connected thinking, simultaneously help differentiate and integrate complex issues, and guide the thinking process. These findings are important for designing better tools and the nurturing of critical managerial competencies needed for a complicated world. Our study's focus also has wider implications for scholars as we see our own material evaluated by those who will put these lessons into practice.     

Entrepreneurial migrants from/in emerging economies: breaking taboos and stereotypes

Entrepreneurial migration from/in emerging economies, as grand societal and humanitarian challenges that we currently face, underscores the need for scholarly research. In our role as social science researchers, this special issue aimed to stimulate scholars from different social science fields to rethink more broadly about the opportunities for making an impact with our research focus on entrepreneurial migration from/in emerging economies. This article provides an overview of the theoretical, empirical, managerial, and policy implications of entrepreneurial migrants from/in emerging economies research. It puts forward key concepts and measures, explores the relations within the current broader literature on migration and entrepreneurship, and identifies several gaps that represent future research questions. We also introduce eight papers in a special section of this issue, which offer answers to critical gaps and questioning some taboos/stereotypes related entrepreneurial migrants. We conclude by outlining an agenda for engaging the academic community to extend research on entrepreneurial migrants from/in emerging economies. It is the perfect time to “make a difference” through our research, teaching, and interaction with multiple socioeconomic agents to constitute impacts that “endorse a real transformation” for supporting the migrants’ community.

     

A network approach toward literature review

This study introduces a method that uses a network approach towards literature review. To employ this approach, we use hypotheses proposed in scientific publications as building blocks. In network terms, a hypothesis is a directed tie between two concepts or nodes. The network emerges by aggregating the hypotheses from a set of articles in a specific domain. This study explains the method and its potential for reviewing literature in a particular domain. As a proof of concept, we provide a case study reviewing the research literature on the adoption of eGovernment services. Our analyses show that a network approach towards literature review provides novel insights into the current state of a research domain. Although there are limitations, this approach has the potential to help scholarly communities focus their research and formulate new research questions.     

Public servants’ workplace learning: a reflection on the concept of communities of practice

Workplace learning is not only for the purpose of improving work skills, but also of establishing linkages between different social resources. Scholars such as Lave and Wenger (Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation, 1991) suggest that a community of practice (CoP) is formed by members’ common interests with a friendly informal atmosphere, within which the participants may feel free, to sharpen their skills and broaden their horizons. The concept of CoPs actually highlights the importance of using social resources to optimize the knowledge within the context of organization. However, because the learning situation is very informal, some scholars suggested that learning within a CoP may be too scattered to manage it well. For this study, the researchers use the concept of CoPs to examine public servants’ workplace learning and lay the focus on shared practices in the public sector in order to reflect on the concept of CoPs. The semi-structured interview method was employed, and most of viewpoints in this study were derived from 10 personnel departments in the public sector in Taiwan including 22 interviewees. The research supports the view that shared practices which are derived from the public servants’ daily official tasks are an important key to members’ informal learning. The concept of official tasks implies a compulsory atmosphere which enables related interactions to be compelled to happen. This will hopefully provide a solution for the loose discipline learning in CoPs.     

Acculturation and Individualism as Predictors of Work‐Family Conflict in a Diverse Workforce

Ethnic and cultural diversity is an increasing reality in the US workplace. The current study highlights the importance of acknowledging the culturally heterogeneous nature of ethnic groups, and the need to focus on social identity characteristics such as cultural values when assessing group differences. We demonstrate that cultural values (i.e., individualism) contribute to employees' experiences of work‐family conflict beyond the effects of ethnicity. Specifically, we introduce a model informed by social identity theory that explains why acculturation is related to work‐family conflict. The model was tested with a sample of 309 employed Caucasian and Hispanic Americans. An empirical test of our model provides evidence that individualism mediates the relationship between language‐ and social‐based acculturation and work‐family conflict, even when controlling for ethnicity. Additionally, alternative models further reveal that the effects of acculturation and individualism contribute to work interfering with family. As an implication of the current study, we suggest that researchers and organizational managers should consider the cultural values of their diverse workforce when implementing policies that affect conflict between work and family. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.