Tourist Guides and Job Related Problems,Analysis and Evidence from Jordan

This study investigates the challenges that professional Jordanian tourist guides may encounter. The implication of this research stems from the fact that very little research, at least in Jordan, has addressed the problems that tourist guides encounter. Qualitative methods, using participants’ observations and in-depth interviewing methods, were used to generate insights from the collected data. The results reveal multiple critical challenges that impact the professional stability of tourist guides. Further efforts are required to fully understand the needs of tourist guides.     

Building Mobile Brand Equity: The Mediating Roles of Perceived Values

This research tests the mediational roles of hedonic and utilitarian values consumers receive from using mobile data services (MDS) on the relationship between mobile commerce experience and mobile provider brand equity. A theoretical model was developed based on a review of the existing literature, and a survey was developed to test the model using a sample of 371 students in major universities in Jordan. The structural findings showed that MDS experience positively influence MDS provider image, which positively influenced both utilitarian and hedonic values, the effect being stronger for the utilitarian value. Moreover, both types of perceived values from using the MDS fully mediate the effect of MDS provider image on mobile equity.     

Fractional integration in daily stock market indices at Jordan's Amman stock exchange

Using daily data on five sectoral indices from 2006 to 2014, this paper aims to investigate the possibility of fractional integration in sectoral returns (and their volatility measures) at Jordan's Amman stock exchange (ASE). Empirical analysis, using the log-periodogram (LP) and local whittle (LW) based semi-parametric fractional differencing techniques suggest that all sectoral returns at ASE exhibit short memory. However, in the case of volatility measures, we found evidence of long memory. Following the recent literature that argues that structural breaks in a time series could also explain the presence of long memory, we tested the volatility measures for the presence of structural breaks. We found that long memory in some volatility measures could be attributed to the presence of structural breaks. Furthermore, using impulse response functions (IRF) based on ARFIMA, we found that shocks to sectoral returns at ASE exhibit short run persistence, whereas shocks to volatility measures display long run persistence.     

Competition or Oligarchy?: The Jordanian Business Elite in Historical Perspective

Abstract

It is of ten stated that eco nomic re form in Jor dan is com -pli cated by the fact that the rent cir cu la tion dur ing the oil boom of the 1970s and early 1980s has led to the emer gence of an allocative state sub or di nat ing the pri vate sec tor. How ever, as I will ar gue in this pa per, there ex ists a pri vate sec tor elite in Jor dan en joy ing vast priv i leges that con trib utes to the prob lem of trans form ing a rent-based econ omy into a fully-fledged, com pet i tive mar ket econ omy. The pa per fo cuses there fore on the his tor i cal de vel op ment of this busi ness elite and on its re la tion ship with se nior bu reau crats.     

一阶常系数线性齐次微分方程组的两种解法

一阶常系数线性齐次微分方程组其中的求解,一般有两种解法。第一种,归结为求矩阵A的特征值和特征向量,微分方程组(1)的解的一般结构完全由代数问题的解所决定。第二种,归结为求矩阵A的Jordan标准形,从而可以写出,由其中为可逆矩阵,求出即为方程组(1)的解。     

Green Marketing and the Concern over the Environment: Measuring Environmental Consciousness of Jordanian Consumers

SUMMARY

The purpose of this article is to explore the attitudes of Jordanian consumers regarding both their current environmental consciousness and their willingness to adopt environmentally friendly consumption behavior. The article is based on an empirical investigation of consumer attitudes for a sample of 303 university students drawn from Jordanian universities, using a drop-off method. The article concludes that Jordanian consumers were, generally, concerned about the environment, as they demonstrated reasonably high levels of environmental consciousness relating to various environmental issues. However, this pro-environmental attitude was not sufficient to turn good intentions into actual buying actions, possibly due to several factors, such as loyalty to traditional products and weak credibility of “green” claims. The article stresses the need to link consumers' good intentions to actual buying behavior through a green marketing strategy, which focuses on the unique characteristics of green products and how they impact the environment, within the cultural context of the Jordanian consumer. Over time, we hope that these efforts can lead to a culture of green consumerism within a framework of environmental responsibility.     

The Potential for Developing Community-based Tourism among the Bedouins in the Badia of Jordan

Population displacement through desertification has affected the socioeconomic and cultural development of Jordan's Badia desert. To counterbalance this change, it is important to preserve and revitalise cultural heritage as a source of tourism development in the desert. One possible way of revitalising the Badia regions is to highlight their cultural resources for tourism. The goal of the study is to find alternative tourism resources based on understanding the potential tourism resources in the Badia and to attract tourists for cultural heritage experiences. The analysis suggests new opportunities for cultural heritage tourism with elements of Bedouin material and non-material culture. Solutions include establishing community-based Bedouin tourism that involves the local people in partnership with the BRDC,1 expanding the tourism network to include the Badia region using resources such as folkways and archaeology to enrich the experience, building a rest house; and erecting a Bedouin heritage village. This will generate income and give Badia indigenous communities additional revenue, thereby positively impacting the regional and national economy.     

Organisational characteristics and the practice of strategic planning in Jordanian hotels

This study examines the effects of some organisational characteristics on the practice of strategic planning in Jordanian hotels. Data was collected via a questionnaire survey of Jordanian hotels in two cities: namely Petra and Aqaba. The results indicate that Jordanian hotels engage with the strategic planning process by using a number of its techniques and that the nature of this engagement is affected by organisational size but not by type of ownership.     

The Impact Of Business Intelligence Systems on an Organization’s Effectiveness: The Role of Metadata Quality From a Developing Country’S View

ABSTRACT

Business Intelligence (BI) systems are extensively used by large hotels in Jordan; however their effectiveness has not yet been researched. The aim of this research is to explore the relationships among definitional metadata quality, data quality metadata quality, navigational metadata quality, lineage metadata quality, perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness and system effectiveness in enhancing organizational effectiveness of five star hotels in Aqaba, Jordan. To test the research hypotheses, 225 usable responses containing 37 items were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) and a Machine Learning technique. Results suggest that organizational effectiveness was directly and positively affected by perceived usefulness and BI systems effectiveness. Nevertheless, perceived usefulness did not impact BI systems effectiveness.